School Daze
by the kid from colorado
Summary: What happens when you put crazy teachers, mutant cafeteria food, a pyromaniac and TWO undercover superhero teams in one school? And when two of your worst enemies have teamed up to kill you... high school just got that much harder. Reposted.
1. School?

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Hey guys! I felt so bad about not having updated in so long that I decided to repost the story (that, and I needed to fix the fifty billion typos scattered throughout the pages). Well, here it is again—I'll be posting every week until I run out of chapters, so I hope you like it enough to keep up! Here we go again.

Chapter 1:

_School?_

The pool on the roof of the Tower was still. Not a breath of wind disturbed the surface. The nearby volleyball court was empty, and the net hung low in a tired sort of way. Although summer would soon be drawing to a close, the heat was still unbearable. But that wasn't the reason the Teen Titans weren't outside right now.

Nope. The teens were shying from the sunlight, staying inside where there were video games and books and soda and, of course, pizza.

"Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh!" cried one Titan. He was the smallest of the five, and, oddly, his face was green. In fact, his whole body was green. His skin was the color of new grass, and his hair was a shade of evergreen. His eyes were deep, dark green, and at the moment they were wide open in a mix of excitement and pure terror. "No no _no!" _he shouted as his fingers flew over the game controller. The green ship on the screen wobbled unsteadilyas a blue and white one shot by. The green boy finally lost all control of his ship, and it went spinning off the track.

WINNER: CYBORG flashed up on the screen.

"Aw, _man!"_ the green boy whined, slumping back into the couch. The other boy beside him grinned. He was an older male, tall and of a heavy build—literally. He was mostly made of metal, and bright blue circuits pulsed through the metal like veins. Everything from his chest down was metal. The only skin that was visible was on one half of his face, revealing that he was African-American, with a dark, handsome complexion. His mouth twisted up in a victorious grin, a grin that reached hisone human, dark brown eye; the other side of his face was metal, and the eye was red and capable of many fascinating functions—infrared vision, for one.

"Sorry, Beastboy," he laughed, his grin revealing that he wasn't really sorry at all. "But I just kicked your butt!"

"Yeah, yeah," Beastboy muttered. But then he sprang back up, chipper as ever, and added, "C'mon, Cyborg, rematch!"

"Ah, _no_, I don't think so," said a voice to Beastboy's left, "seeing as it's now _my _turn." A green-gloved hand plucked the controller out of Beastboy's grasp, and the changeling turned to look at the face of the masked youth sitting next to him.

"Aw, come on, Robin," Beastboy pleaded. "Surely you can find it in your heart to let me get my dignity back by beating Cyborg in one more game?" The masked boy put a thoughtful look on his face, then replied, "Nope, sorry, can't find it. Now move over, Beastboy, you're in my spot."

"Dude, this is _my _spot."

"No. See, when you lose, you go sit over _there_, and the next player sits _here_. Get it?"

"Why can't you just play from over there?"

"Because that's not how we do it. Will you move already?"

"Honestly, Robin, I'm going to have to side with Beastboy on this one," said a new voice. Robin turned to look at the other side of the sofa, where a girl was sitting reading a book, her blue cloak drawn up so that it covered her hair and cast her pale face in shadows. "Why is it so important to sit where Beastboy is?"

"Thank you, Raven!" Beastboy told her appreciatively. Raven merely grunted in reply.

"Because it's my spot! When we watch TV, when we play video games, and when we're just crashing, that's _my spot_."

"Whatever," she responded. "I just can't see the point…"

"Take down your hood, then, and maybe you'll be able to see things better." Even before Raven used her powers to hurl a pillow at him with enough force to knock him against the wall, Robin regretted opening his mouth. Messing with Raven was about as smart as poking a sleeping grizzly in the eye.

"Oh!" cried a delighted voice. A redheaded girl with vibrant green eyes and an orange skin tone suddenly popped up out of nowhere. "Are we to initiate in the fighting of pillows?"

"Huh?" asked Beastboy. "Oh, pillow fight. No, Star, Raven was just getting Robin to clam up." To prove his point, the changeling turned into a green oyster and clamped his mouth shut. Starfire looked slightly put out. Starfire was from a planet called Tamaran, and her English still had a lot to be desired. Most of the things she said were easy enough to understand, but other things were way out in left field.

The doorbell rang suddenly. Robin tossed the pillow off of his face and looked at his fellow Teen Titans. "Did someone order pizza without telling me?" he asked. The others just shook their heads. "Ah, well, I'll get it. Starfire, if Beastboy gets anywhere near that controller, please blast him into the next dimension."

"Um…" Starfire answered reluctantly, rising a few feet off the floor, her head tilted curiously to one side. "What if I do not wish to harm Beastboy?"

"I was kidding, Star." Robin couldn't help but smile at his friend's naïveté. Even though Robin cared deeply for each of his friends, he was especially fond of Starfire. He went over to the front door and opened it.

A rather small woman was standing on the other side of the door. She looked neat in a gray suit and she carried a briefcase. Her iron-gray hair was twisted up into a bun and her face was drawn into something just short of a scowl. Behind her was…. Well, Robin couldn't exactly tell whether the person behind her was a man or a woman, but he didn't think it would score any brownie points with either of them if he asked.

"Hello," he said in as polite a voice as he knew how. "May we help you with something?" The woman pushed past him and came into the room. The second person followed her, and Robin, looking down, could see that the person was wearing a skirt. Definitely a woman, then.

"Um," Robin said, a little ruffled at the fact that they had come in without an invitation. "Sorry about the mess—we didn't know we'd be having company." He injected as much contempt as he thought he could get away with into the last sentence, accompanied by the slight embarrassment he felt when he looked at the Titan's living quarters. Pizza boxes were stacked in a haphazard pile on the kitchen counter, and a mountain of dirty dishes overflowed the sink. Beastboy had left several pairs of clearly unwashed socks lying in random places. Robin and Cyborg, being boys, had added their little personal touches too, and Raven and Starfire had made it certain that one only had to look into the Tower to tell that there were females present.

"Hmm," the woman in the suit grunted. _How ladylike_, Robin thought scathingly. He couldn't figure out what, but something about these people definitely bothered him—like a cat with its fur rubbed the wrong way. Robin waited in silence for a few moments, but it became quite apparent that the woman wasn't going to say anything else. Running his fingers through his spiky black hair in aggravation, he sighed and called out, "Hey, Titans! Come in here, we have guests!"

Each Titan made a different entrance. Beastboy came in slumped over and whining; Cyborg was laughing and teasing Beastboy mercilessly (it seemed Beastboy had touched the controller and gotten himself whipped soundly at the video game). Starfire floated in with her sunny smile, determined to make a good impression, and Raven appeared in a mass of black magic that manifested itself in the form of—well, a raven. She barely glanced up from the heavy black book she was holding, her amethyst eyes still focused on the print.

The woman studied each of them intently, and then sighed in very much the same way as Robin had done moments before.

"Well," she said in a less-than-thrilled voice. "I don't suppose there's any doubt that you _are_ the Teen Titans."

"Uh, lady," Beastboy interjected, "who else could we be? Are there any other teenagers running around in spandex that you know about?"

The green changeling received a sharp elbow in the ribs from Raven, who had finally put her book down and lowered her hood, revealing her short, purplish hair. Robin couldn't suppress a groan and he slapped himself on the forehead. This was _not _going to end well.

"Yes, we're the Titans," he said quickly, cutting off Beastboy, who had opened his mouth to say something testy to Raven, which probably would have resulted in someone getting thrown out the fourth-story window. "Can we help you in any way? Do you have some trouble you'd like to report?" He drew himself up and tried to look intimidating. "In case you haven't noticed, we _are_ superheroes."

"Yes, I noticed," the woman replied, giving Robin a look that would have curdled milk. The Boy Wonder decided any more smart remarks would be a stupid idea. He fell into line beside his teammates. "That is what makes this so hard.

"I am Mrs. Gardner, the head of the Education Committee of Jump City," she continued. "According to the new 'No Child Left Behind' order by the President, every child under the age of eighteen must get a proper education." She paused, hoping for some reaction from the teenagers in front of her. The Teen Titans just stared at her. Mrs. Gardner cleared her throat and went on. "It has come to my attention that you five do not attend any school, public or private. You also have no tutor. In short, you are not receiving any sort of formal education."

"Oh, but we are!" exclaimed Starfire delightedly. "I have learned much about your planet by the use of the television. I know how to prepare a soup from the cream of a mushroom, which I learned on the cooking channel, and which type of fungus grows on the inside of the bathtub and on the food in our refrigerator. I saw a wonderful documentary about the content of hot dogs, and I have learned how to—" She cut herself off abruptly, seeing the looks on her friends' faces. "Have I said something wrong?" she asked innocently.

"What I think she means is that we do sort of get an education," Cyborg explained. "I mean, we watch the Discovery Channel and National Geographic and stuff like that."

"Indeed," Mrs. Gardner sniffed, clearly not impressed. "But there is only so much you can learn from the television. The TV cannot teach you the components of Shakespeare, or advanced Algebra. It is crucial that young people such as yourselves have a proper education, and because you children are _not_ receiving a proper education, the Education Committee of Jump City has voted to send you to school."

There was utter silence at that. Robin was stunned, Beastboy looked horrified, Raven had cocked her eyebrows in a sort of "Excuse me?" look, Cyborg was standing with his mouth wide open, and poor Starfire looked just plain confused.

"W-_what?"_ Beastboy finally managed to stutter. _"School?"_

"I believe I spoke quite clearly, Mr.—" Mrs. Gardner had fully intended on following that "Mr." up with the boy's last name, but seeing as she didn't know it, she simply finished, "Mr. Beastboy."

"Ma'am, I don't think you understand," Robin told her, regaining his composure and being as polite as possible. "If we went to school, and someone like Cinderblock or Slade decided to attack the city, how would we help?"

"We have thought that through fully," Mrs. Gardner answered calmly. "You will be excused from class to save the city if the need arises."

None of the Titans could see of any way to combat this statement.

"But," Cyborg blurted out, "you can't send us to school. We'll attract too much attention. I mean, come on, how many students are going to pay attention in History class when the Teen Titans are sitting a few rows back?"

"As I said, we have thought this through fully," the woman told him. "We ask that you go—_undercover_, if you will, so as not to attract attention. Which would mean," she added, seeing their mystified looks, "dressing and behaving like normal teenagers."

"So… no spandex?" asked Beastboy. Robin fought to keep a straight face. Mrs. Gardner appeared to fight a smile back herself, but she quickly regained her stony visage.

"No, Mr. Beastboy, I'm afraid spandex is against the dress code for public schools in this city. As are, erm, _revealing_ outfits on the part of the ladies." Starfire looked as confused as ever, but Raven went a little pink. So did all three of the boys, and they determinedly looked at the ceiling.

"But, still—" Robin protested, hoping to find some way out of this. "It'll attract attention, when five kids suddenly decide to leave the room at random moments during the day."

Mrs. Gardner sighed. They were really making this more difficult than it had to be. "Well, if you are totally against the idea of going to school, there is an alternative."

The Titans immediately looked interested. The woman beside Mrs. Gardner took a step forward. "This is Miss Gerda," Mrs. Gardner explained.

"Dude, that's a _wo_--?" Beastboy started to ask, but Raven, knowing exactly what he was about to say, stomped on his foot.

"If you five decide not to attend school, Gerda will become your private tutor. She will live here in the Titans Tower, and give you your education in your own home. This way you will be able to go save the city whenever Jump City needs you, but it will also mean you will have an adult in the Tower at all times."

"I vould be most 'appy to educate vunderful cheeldrin such as yourselves," said Gerda in a thick accent. She smiled at them in a way that sent goosebumps racing up their arms, revealing a row of gray, tombstone-like teeth.

All five Titans were thinking. An _adult _in the Tower? _At all times? _An adult would be able to put restrictions on the Gamestation. An adult had the power to assign chores, and to barge into bedrooms without asking. An adult would never allow them to regulate their own diets of pizza and junk food and whatever else they felt like eating at the time. Adults asked, "Where are you going?" every time you went out, and assigned times to be back. Adults would publicly inquire on whether or not you were wearing clean underwear. Adults had curfews, and _bedtimes_, and the unquestionable ability to _ground_ their charges. An _adult_ in the Titans Tower?

"Could you excuse us for a moment?" asked Robin, and the Teen Titans drew into a circle and huddled together like a football team.

"School." All five of them said it at the exact same time. It was unanimous.

"We'll take the school," Robin told Mrs. Gardner, turning back around to her. Gerda looked indifferent, still smiling blankly. Mrs. Gardner smirked.

"Excellent," she said approvingly. "Now, you will be attending Jump City High School. I believe you all know where it is located. The school year starts on August 15."

"_August 15?" _Beastboy gasped in horror. "That's next Monday!"

"Yes," scowled Mrs. Gardner. "It has been _quite _a hassle, getting you notified on such short notice. We will have to get you registered and your schedules printed out and everything. Oh, speaking of registering…" She pulled out a clipboard. "I need names to register you under."

"Huh?" asked Cyborg, having a brief moment of stupidity. "Why can't we go by the names we use now?" Mrs. Gardner raised an eyebrow.

"I daresay your names themselves will attract unwanted attention, will they not?" she asked pointedly. Cyborg went a little red.

"Oh, right. I knew that." He thought for a moment. "Well, I guess I could go with my real name. Victor Stone." Mrs. Gardner wrote it down.

"Yeah, I'll go by my real name too," said Beastboy suddenly. "It's Garfield Logan—quit laughing, _Victor_," he snapped to Cyborg, who had just burst into an unexpected fit of the giggles. "Make sure to put on there that I prefer being called Gar."

"It has been noted." Mrs. Gardner looked up from her clipboard and turned her attention to Starfire.

"My Tamaranean name is Koriand'r," said Starfire slowly, "but I do not think it is a suitable Earth name. Nor is the name Starfire."

"I've got it," Robin told her reassuringly. "Why not just call yourself Kori Anders?" Starfire smiled at him gratefully.

"Yes," she replied, "I believe I shall be content with that name. Please be sure to spell it K-O-R-I, so I will not be mistaken for a boy."

"Raven," said the telekinetic as Mrs. Gardner turned to her. Mrs. Gardner waited as Raven thought of a suitable last name. After a moment of thought, she smiled and said, "Raven Allen." Mrs. Gardner gave a tight little smile as she wrote it down.

"Am I correct in assuming," she asked, looking at Raven over her glasses, "that you are combining the poem _The Raven, _and the writer Edgar Allen Poe as a name for yourself?"

"Yes," Raven replied, slightly pleased that someone had been able to figure out her reasoning.

"That leaves only one of you," Mrs. Gardner said. She turned to the last teen, who looked pale and anxious underneath his mask.

"I don't know," Robin admitted, running his fingers through his hair, like he often did when he was nervous. "I—I can't really think of a name at the moment."

"No need to worry, Mr.—" Mrs. Gardner lifted the paper she was writing on and looked at what appeared to be a file underneath it. "Grayson. Your transcript has already been sent by Mr. Wayne."

Robin went as white as a sheet. The others looked at him, surprised. None of them had known Robin's name before.

"How—how did you…?"

"When the Education Committee voted to send you Titans to school, all of our major funders were notified. One of them happened to be Bruce Wayne. He requested that I meet him in Gotham, where he told me the whole story, and gave me your transcript. I now know the identities of Batman and Robin, but rest assured," she added, seeing Robin's horrorstruck expression, "your secrets are safe with me. The Dark Knight swore me to silence, and I will keep my word. I am the only one who knows, as I have told no one else. Not even the school administrators know that they will be taking in the Teen Titans as students, so there is no way for either your or Mr. Wayne's identities to be discovered."

"What about her?" asked Robin, pointing to Gerda. "You've just practically given us away with her in the room."

A sly grin flickered briefly across Mrs. Gardner's features. "Oh, you need not worry about Gerda. She has absolutely no idea what we're saying. She only speaks Scandinavian. The sentence you heard her say earlier is the only English she knows."

"So," asked Raven, a trace of anger in her voice, "she _wouldn't _have been our tutor?"

"Oh, no. But she made for an excellent tool of persuasion."

"Wow. That's really low, even for a grown-up," said Beastboy in awe.

"I'm going to choose to ignore that," Mrs. Gardner replied. "Well, now that I've got the necessary information, I must get back to the office. I have to get your schedules made up and everything else." She turned to leave. "Oh, one more thing," she said suddenly. "You all might want to create pasts for yourselves, just to be safe in case anyone asks. And Mr. Grayson, it wouldn't hurt if you _didn't_ mention that you are Bruce Wayne's ward. If you were discovered, one can put two and two together. We'll just show ourselves out." She said something in rapid Scandinavian to Gerda, who followed her out the door.

The Titans stood for a minute in silence.

"Dude!" Cyborg said in awe, looking at Robin. "Your adoptive father is _Bruce Wayne?"_ Robin nodded mutely, still looking rather pale. "But that must mean… Oh,_ man."_ Cyborg slapped a hand to his forehead. "That means Bruce Wayne is _Batman."_

"Yes," said Robin in a hollow voice.

"Dude, why didn't you tell us?" asked Beastboy.

"I was sworn to secrecy," Robin replied. "I couldn't tell anyone. Even you guys."

"So?" asked Raven. "What's your real name?" Robin hesitated.

"Richard Grayson," he admitted finally. "Otherwise known as Dick."

On Robin's behalf, the other two boys made a valiant attempt not to laugh.

"Oh, that is a most wonderful Earth name!" said Starfire, seeing how troubled her friend was.

"Thanks, Star," Robin said gratefully. Then he groaned. "Man, I can't believe they're sending us to _school_."

"Why is this such a bad thing?" Starfire inquired. "You told me that Earth schools are nothing like the schools of the Mad Mod."

"Well, they aren't, really…" said Robin, wondering how to explain.

"They're worse!" Beastboy cried. "The teachers brainwash you with _books_, and they give you tons and tons of homework every night, and they make you sit in a classroom for hours at a time, and—" Thankfully, Raven, seeing how Beastboy was scaring Starfire, put a band of black magic around his mouth, so that all they could hear were his distressed but unrecognizable muffled yells. Robin shook his head, and tried to undo the damage Beastboy had done to Starfire.


	2. Disguises

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans (or Danny Phantom), obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

I know it's a slow start, guys, but please bear with me. It gets a lot better later on.

By the way, I know that in the show the characters are a bit older than this, but I brought down their ages a bit to fit the situation (plus it helps me relate to them a bit more). Thanks to my first three reviewers, **The Hecatae, HiGirl** and **acosta perez jose ramiro.**

Chapter 2:

Disguises

The school schedules arrived a few days later, along with the supply lists. The Titans swore not to look at their schedules until they got all of the school shopping done, which included school clothes and notebooks and shoes and backpacks. It took almost all day, because Starfire couldn't seem to decide what exactly she wanted to wear, and had them running all over the mall. Everyone except Starfire agreed that school shopping had to be one of the most miserable experiences of their lives. Robin, Cyborg, and Beastboy got stuck carrying the girls' purchases along with their own, and by the time they collapsed onto the couch back at the Tower, it was nine o'clock and they were exhausted.

"Okay," said Robin, taking out his schedule. "Now that we're back from the Mall from Hell, let's see what classes we've got."

The Titans compared schedules.

"Hey, look, I've got Algebra first period," said Robin. "Alright, so do you, Kori."

Ever since Mrs. Gardner had told them they would be going by different names, the Titans had practiced calling each other by those names, just so they didn't forget.

"Yes, it is most fortunate, friend Dick," agreed Starfire.

"Hey, we've all got Algebra first period," said Cyborg, looking over at Raven and Beastboy's schedules. "Beast—I mean, Gar, how the heck did you manage to get into _Algebra_?"

"I'm going to ignore that," Beastboy snapped. "We've _all_ got Algebra? Shouldn't we be in different grades?"

Robin shrugged. "I guess, without your transcripts, it was just easier for them to put us all in the same grade level." He glanced at his schedule. "Looks like we're all freshmen; that works for me, I won't be fifteen until March."

"I just turned fourteen," shrugged Beastboy. "I should probably still be in eight grade, but hey, I'm fine with this."

"I'm fifteen—I should be one grade up," said Raven, displeased.

"And I should be a junior! Aw, man," said Cyborg. "This stinks. People are going to think I'm a total idiot."

"If you apply yourself, you might just get to skip," said Robin reassuringly. "And no one said you had to say how old you are."

"You know, they _could've _tracked down my transcript," growled Cyborg. "They just _didn't._ They could've tracked down BB's, too."

"No," argued Beastboy. "I lived in Africa, remember? My mom home schooled me."

"If you two would stop talking and look at your schedules, I for one would like to know what else we have to take," snapped Raven. "I have Advanced Language Arts."

"Me, too," said Cyborg and Robin at the same time.

"I have Language Arts of the normal variety," said Starfire, sounding disappointed.

"I've got history," groaned Beastboy. "But me and Robin have Spanish after that."

"We do?" Robin checked his schedule. "Yep, Spanish third period."

"I have History," said Raven. She peered over to see her friends' schedules. "So do Starfire and Cyborg, or should I say, Kori and Victor."

"OK, fourth period has us all over the place. These are our electives. Oh no…." Robin groaned. _"Home Ec.?_ They've got to be kidding!"

"I'll trade with you," said Beastboy glumly. "I got Art…I can't draw worth crap…"

"Ooh, I got lucky," grinned Cyborg. "Computers. This'll be a cinch."

"What is 'Band'?" asked Starfire.

"You get to learn to play an instrument," said Raven. "Apparently, I will be learning to walk around stage in an idiotic costume. I got Drama."

"That's not so bad," said Robin. "Wish I were in Drama—at least I could work with the props and equipment and stuff. I have Gym next."

"Me, too," said Raven and Beastboy at the same time.

"Us too," said Cyborg, looking at Starfire's. "Cool, another class with everybody."

"That's good," said Beastboy, looking at his schedule. "Aw, cool, I have Biology next! That's my best subject!"

"Great, I can copy off of you, then," said Robin, seeing that he had it too. "I'm just _kidding,"_ he added, seeing the glare Raven was giving him. "Jeez, like I can't hold my own in class."

"We all have Biology during seventh period," said Starfire. "Cy--_Victor_, Raven and I have French while you and Garth attend the class of the study of life."

"It's _Gar,_ Kori. You'll get it." Beastboy sighed. "Looks like I'm on my own during seventh—Language Arts."

"I have History," said Robin. "Oh well. At least we have some of our classes together. There are only a few where we'll have to go on our own. That's not too bad."

"Yeah, I guess not," sighed Beastboy. "It's going to be weird, not being together all the time. When we're together, we've always got someone to watch our backs. I'm going to be a sitting duck in Language Arts—I'm short and green. That's just begging to be a target for at least one bully."

"Aw, you can take 'em," grinned Cyborg, punching Beastboy playfully on the shoulder. "And while you may be short, we can do something about the green. I want to show y'all something. Sit tight for a sec, I've got to go get it outta my room."

"Man, why do we have to hide our true identities?" whined Beastboy.

"Well, first of all," said Robin, "we'll be a distraction for the other students in class. Secondly, we'll get made fun of for some reason or another, and third, we'll get mobbed by fans."

"…. And this is a bad thing _how?"_

When Cyborg came back, he was holding something in his hand. He was also wearing a pair of baggy cargo shorts and a black T-shirt.

"Remember when I had to go undercover as a HIVE student, and I used a hologram projector in a ring to disguise myself?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Well, I figured I could do the same thing for us, except I made a few adjustments. Now the hologram just projects itself over our physical bodies, instead of our clothes, too."

"Oh," nodded Robin, suddenly very glad that Cyborg had put on the shirt and pants. By the amused smile on Raven's face, he could tell she was thinking the same thing.

"I made one for me, Starfire, and Beastboy. You two can blend in pretty well, even if Raven's hair and eyes are purple."

Robin looked at Raven. "You're really not going to have a disguise?"

"Not like that," said Raven in monotone. "I've already prepared a spell that allows me to take on a different appearance for everyone who I don't want to see my real form."

"So… to us, you'll look like Raven, but to other people, you'll look like someone else?"

"Exactly."

"Glad you two got that all worked out," said Cyborg, obviously annoyed that his demonstration had been interrupted. "Now, if you two will come on up here." He motioned to Star and BB. Cyborg then addressed Raven and Robin, who were the only ones left on the couch. "Now, lady and gentle—well, lady and Robin," (Robin scowled) "prepare to be amazed as Cyborg, Starfire and Beastboy become—" He put on his ring, and instantly the hologram projector worked its magic. Cyborg's metal body disappeared, replaced by dark, handsome skin that stretched over his rippling muscles. The red eye was gone, leaving a chocolate brown one in its place. He grinned widely with his now whole mouth, causing his eyes to crinkle up at the edges. "Victor Stone!" he announced proudly. He reached over and put another ring on Starfire's finger. It was small, elegant, and finer than Cyborg's, with a bright green gem in the center. "Kori Anders!"

Starfire's orange skin was covered in a golden tan that looked similar but very different at the same time. Her eyebrows lengthened to resemble a human's. The area around her irises became white instead of green, and if she hadn't been floating, the only unusual thing Robin could have pointed out was that she was still extraordinarily beautiful. Starfire examined her bronzed arms and squealed with delight.

"And Garfield Logan!" Cyborg approached Beastboy, but the changeling backed off, his gloved hands held up defensively.

"I'm not wearing a ring," he said flatly. Cyborg grinned.

"That's okay, Gar. I knew you wouldn't go for the whole jewelry thing, so I made something special." He held up a shark tooth, suspended by a leather thong.

"Oh, cool!" Beastboy took it readily and tied it around his neck. Instantly the Titans saw what Garfield Logan had looked like before he became Beastboy. He had a bronze tan, though not quite as dark as Starfire, and his hair was light, sun-bleached brown. His ears, normally elfishly pointed, had rounded tips like a normal human. Gar's eyes were still the same dark green, and seemed odd in contrast with his face, but still attractive. Beastboy stripped one of the gloves off his hand and examined the long, thin fingers. _"Whoa," _he breathed. "Cy, this is incredible!"

"Yup!" Cyborg grinned. "The hologram projector is in the tooth. As long as you keep the necklace on, you should stay like that."

"What?" asked Raven, looking at Beastboy in an amused sort of way. "You aren't going to launch into insane ranting about the cruelty of taking teeth from a shark?"

"No," said Beastboy, sticking his tongue out briefly. "Sharks often lose and shed their teeth. They can shed them a row at a time, and they grow them back quickly. You can find shark teeth all over the ocean floor if you know where to look. See?" He flashed them a grin. "I told you I was good at Biology."

"Impressive," grinned Robin. "You too, Cy. They're amazing. I wouldn't be surprised if the teacher quit and let you teach the Computers class." Cyborg laughed and took off his ring. The other two did the same.

"Well," said Raven, folding her arms. "Now what? We've got the supplies, the disguises, the names… there doesn't seem to be anything else to do for this school thing except wait."

"Then I guess we wait," said Robin grimly.


	3. Not a Morning Person

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Um… I'd also like to add that I don't own the History channel, or Animal Planet, or the Jeff Corwin Experience

Oops! I almost forgot to upload, but here you go. Thanks for reviewing, guys, it makes me happy! Thanks to **TTforlife** and **longhairedhorse **(I hate that I can't reply on your profile—it sounds like the two of us could come up with some very interesting stuff!). Thanks to **Daxo **too. You're right, Batman wouldn't give up his secret identity to just any old person… but then, Mrs. Gardner's not just any old person (sly grin). I won't say any more. Anyway, enjoy!

Chapter 3:

Not a Morning Person

As it turned out, the next few days were spent doing anything but waiting. Plasmus managed to escape from jail (again) and the Teen Titans had to go kick his butt (again). And then at three in the morning ("Three a.m.!" yelled a very grumpy Beastboy. "What idiot decides to rob a bank at three a.m.?") they had to drag themselves out of bed in order to stop Dr. Light from getting away with all the money in the Jump City bank. In between stopping bad guys, training, sleeping and doing the other ever-important things teenagers have to do (i.e. playing Gamestation, trying to find the remote, arguing over who had to do the dishes, and being lazy), the Titans were cramming for the school year. Robin planted himself firmly in front of the TV and watched everything he could on the History channel (whether or not he learned anything was an entirely different story). Beastboy fought with Robin for the remote and every once in awhile managed to change it to Animal Planet and successfully keep it there for an hour of the _Jeff Corwin Experience. _Cyborg made frequent trips to the library and read everything he could find about Advanced Language Arts, while Raven just read stuff in her room. Starfire flitted between watching TV and reading, so she got a balance of information to use in her new Earth school. Every once in awhile Robin would explain to her how schools worked, the taboos and the do's and don'ts. He also tutored her in the basics of all the subjects she was to take. Luckily, she was pretty well off in Algebra, and she could read fine. He briefed her in History and Biology, just so she would be prepared.

Monday, August 15, came sooner than any of them wanted.

Robin woke up at six a.m., wondering what that annoying sound was that had woken him. It turned out to be his alarm clock, buzzing in the most irritating possible way. He almost hit the snooze button to go back to sleep, but then he remembered what day it was and, with a groan, pulled himself out of bed.

Cyborg was the first person downstairs that morning. His ring was already on, and he was dressed in the same black shirt and cargo shorts he'd worn a few nights before. Yawning, he was pouring coffee to go with his eggs and bacon when Raven came in.

"Morning," he said sleepily. Raven merely glared in reply as she went about fixing herself some herbal tea. She hated being without her cloak, but she really didn't look bad in her dark blue sweater and skirt.

"Good morning, friends!" Starfire sang out, bounding down the stairs cheerfully. Realizing that Earth girls didn't levitate, fly, or have their feet off of the ground most of the time, Starfire had been training herself to walk and run instead of fly. She alone of the Titans seemed to have any desire to go to school. The new experience thrilled Starfire, and she had dressed especially for the occasion: a red top with a green skirt and tennis shoes, and, of course, her hologram projecting ring.

"Morning, Star," replied Cyborg. "Sleep well?"

"Oh, yes, my sleep was most enjoyable. However, I was awoken once or twice by the sound of thumping. Would you happen to know what caused such a noise?"

"I do," said Raven. "That was Beastboy, banging his head against the wall."

Cyborg grinned and took his plate to the table. Raven drank her tea leaning against the counter, while Starfire raided the fridge for mustard and leftover pancakes.

"Hey, has anybody seen Robin and Beastboy?" asked Cyborg, glancing at the clock. "They're gonna be late if they don't hurry up."

As if an answer to his question, the upstairs hallway erupted in noise.

"That doesn't sound good," said Raven, abandoning her tea. She and Starfire flew up the stairs while Cyborg ran behind them.

The hall looked as though something very large had gone on a rampage. Things had been flung off the walls and there was a dent in one. In the center of the wreckage was a raven-haired teenage boy, sprawled on his stomach on the floor, putting all his weight on a glass jar and apparently shouting at it.

"I swear, Beastboy, if you don't cut it out, I'm going to seal the jar and leave you like that for the rest of the year!" the boy hollered. The jar quivered, as though something inside was fighting to get free. "It's an unbreakable jar, Beastboy! You can't shapeshift out of it. So either you quit being a baby and get ready for school, or I'm going to keep you as a pet for the rest of your life!" The jar stopped quivering, and after a moment the boy lifted it, revealing a small green mouse that had been trapped beneath. The mouse morphed back into a very unhappy Beastboy, still in his uniform that he had worn to bed.

_"Fine," _he huffed. He stalked off to his room, muttering quite clearly under his breath, "I would've loved to see you try to keep me as a _pet_ in that stupid _jar_…" He disappeared into his room and the door slammed shut behind him. The boy on the floor sighed, wiped his forehead, and climbed to his feet.

"Well," he said, giving them a grin. "That takes care of that. I swear, Beastboy can be unbelievingly immature sometimes. Apparently, he's not that much of a morning person." The others just stared at him. The boy stood calmly, asking no questions. It was the first time any of the Titans had seen Robin without his mask.

Robin had dressed himself in a plain white T-shirt and jeans. His hair, rather than the trademark spikes, had been combed into submission and lay more or less flat, not like the time Mother Mae-Eye had invaded the Tower and brainwashed them, but flat nonetheless. It stuck up a little in the back. Without his mask, his facial features were sharper, and his smile seemed wider. Where the mask normally covered his face, two large blue eyes returned the Titans' stares.

Starfire found herself studying Robin's eyes very intently. They were amazing—not baby blue or robin's egg blue, but more intense. The color of the sky on a frosty winter morning, or the shade of incredible, dark blue of the Arctic ocean when the sun hits it just right. Ice-chip blue, and they revealed so much of Robin's personality. In his eyes, Starfire could see his determination, his courage, his boldness, his fierce pride, but at the same time she could see mischief, cleverness, cunning, and his quick to grin nature. Looking closer, she could see that he was quite uncomfortable having everyone staring at him for this long, and she blushed and looked away.

"Are you guys done yet?" Robin asked. Cyborg and Raven nodded. Starfire secretly wanted to look more, but she gave him a smile and nodded too. Robin returned the smile, and she noticed immediately how it reached all the way up to his eyes.

"I'm starving; I'm going to get some breakfast." Without another word, he passed by them and walked down the steps to the kitchen.

Raven walked over to the jar and picked it up.

"Remind me to kill him later," she told Cyborg. "He got this out of my room."

Robin poured himself a bowl of cornflakes and ate it at the coffee table in the living room so he could look out over the bay to the city. It always looked so peaceful in the early morning. The first rays of the sunrise were already fading away, making room for the sunlight of midmorning that came so early this time of year. Robin automatically spooned the cereal to his mouth, even though his mind was far away.

He had to admit it—he was nervous. He hadn't been to school in so long—not since he'd left Wayne Manor and joined the Teen Titans. Would his grades be up to scratch? He was an exceptionally smart person, so he shouldn't have any problems with that. What mainly concerned him was that he wouldn't fit in with the other kids. When he'd first come to the Teen Titans, he'd fallen among kindred spirits—people with extraordinary abilities that wished to use their powers to defend the innocent, people who had had tragic things happen in their lives. The five teenagers had become something much closer than friends. They were a family. Cyborg was the hilarious older brother; Raven was something of a sister. Beastboy was the black sheep, always joking around and having something to laugh at at all times. Starfire—well, Starfire was closer than a sister could ever be. Robin was afraid that after not having the need to find friends, he'd forgotten how to make them.

_Well, there's no sense in worrying about it now,_ he told himself, taking his half-eaten breakfast to the sink to rinse out his bowl. He really didn't have much of an appetite. With all the butterflies in his stomach, there wasn't really that much room for food.

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A little later, after Beastboy had gotten dressed and bolted down his breakfast (protein bar and soy milk), and the Titans had scrapped together some lunch money, collected their schedules, and shouldered their bags, they gathered in the living room, going over some last-minute preparations.

"Okay," said Robin. "In case the city needs us during school hours—"

"Which it will," said Beastboy.

"We have to keep our communicators concealed at all times," Robin continued, glaring at the changeling. "Instead of ringing like they normally do, the communicators will vibrate to let you know there's trouble. When that happens, excuse yourselves from class and meet up outside the school. Try to keep a low profile."

"What are we supposed to tell the teachers?" asked Cyborg. He put an innocent face on and raised his hand. "Oh, teacher, may I be excused to go and save the city? Yeah, like that's gonna work."

"I don't know—tell them that you feel sick and have to go to the nurse. Or tell them that you have to use the bathroom. You'll think of something."

After a few more minutes of instruction, the Titans walked together to the front door.

"You know where the bus stop is, right?" Beastboy asked. Robin nodded.

"It's just a few blocks from the pier. If we hurry, we can get there in about twenty minutes."

"And we get to shore _how?"_

"I'm going to teleport us into a deserted alley," said Raven. "But we need to get out in the open. It takes a lot of energy for me to do this, and even more for me to teleport us through walls." Beastboy nodded.

"Okay, Titans," said Robin quietly. "This is it. After we go through these doors, we can't be Robin, Starfire, Cyborg, Raven and Beastboy anymore. We have to be Dick Grayson, Kori Anders, Victor Stone, Raven Allen, and Gar Logan." The others nodded. Robin took a deep breath. "Here goes nothing," he muttered, and opened the door.


	4. Meet Your Bus Mates

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Chapter 4:

Meet your bus mates

"This is it, right?" Victor asked the smaller, raven-haired youth beside him. Dick nodded.

"I told you it was only a few blocks to the bus stop," he said. "Jeez, there are loads more kids than I expected."

The five teenagers moved nervously toward the group of kids clustered around a lamppost on a corner. Some were in tight-knit groups, much like they were, and other kids were standing alone, aloof and uncertain. A few people looked around when the five newcomers joined their midst, but no one gave them much thought. There were lots of new kids at the start of the school year.

"And from here, we shall be catching a bus?" asked Kori, looking down the road as though she expected it to come around the corner at any given moment. "What shall we do with it once we catch it?"

"No, St—Kori. 'Catch the bus' means to get on it."

"Oh," she replied. "Thank you, Dick, for correcting me."

"I guess we're early," said Raven, looking around. "There are still people coming."

"Nope, they're just late. Look." Vic pointed down the road and sure enough, there came the school bus. Its squealing brakes and exhaust fumes billowing from the tailpipe only reminded the five exactly how much they _didn't _want to get on it.

A mob formed at the bus stop, everyone clamoring to get on first so as to get a seat in the back. As it turned out, they needn't have bothered. As each student filed onto the bus, the driver, an extremely cranky-looking woman, asked their name and pointed to their assigned seats.

"Name?" she asked gruffly as Gar stepped onto the bus.

"Garfield Logan," he told her. Gar looked nervously down the aisle. There were a lot of very tall, tough-looking guys.

"Logan, Logan," she said, looking at her clipboard. "Seat seven. Next!"

Poor Gar. He wound up squashed beside two muscled seniors, both with varsity football jackets. Vic was put between two lank-haired, skinny boys. Raven was put between two fast-talking, obviously preppy girls, and Kori was forced to sit between two popular but jerky looking boys.

Dick watched his friends with pity for them and growing dread about where he would be forced to sit.

"Name?" the driver demanded.

"Dick Grayson," he answered quietly. Dick thought he heard a snigger from someone near the front.

"Grayson. Seat thirteen. In the back." Dick looked up. Across a sea of unfriendly faces, along with the faces of his distressed friends, the back of the bus was almost empty except for the very last seat, which was occupied by two Gothic students, and one other person a few seats later. Dick sighed, shouldered his backpack, and began to pick his way between seats and over legs until he reached seat thirteen.

Dick plopped heavily down in the seat, feeling miserable. Almost every other seat had three people in it. So how on Earth had he managed to get stuck sitting alone? He slumped down and looked out the window. The bus slowly pulled away from the stop. The screeching wheels protested, as though the vehicle would have liked nothing more than to fall apart on the spot. Honestly, Dick wished it would—already separated from his friends, the school year had not taken a great start. As the bus gained speed, Dick watched the buildings and street signs flicker past, feeling lonely.

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Gar sat nervously silent beside the two big football players. They had been talking and laughing amongst themselves for the last few minutes, while Gar had ignored all opportunities to start a conversation. Suddenly, one of them turned to him.

"Say, shorty," he said to Gar. Gar felt an angry flush creep up the back of his neck. "Haven't seen you around before. Where're you from?"

Gar shrugged. _Yeah, I'll bet you haven't seen me before. I've probably saved your butt more times than one._ Of course, he had the sense to keep his thoughts in his head, and instead answered, "Around."

The senior raised an eyebrow.

"Around? That's it?"

"Pretty much."

"Okay, then. Play any sports?"

"No… not really." Gar suddenly wished that he had joined a rec league of some kind, just to be able to say that he did indeed play a sport to these people who obviously associated worth with athletic ability.

"Plan on trying out for football?" the other senior asked, looking around his friend's massive shoulder.

"I don't know—I haven't really thought of it much. Do you think I'd make it?" They didn't seem so bad to Gar. Maybe he could make some friends before the bus ride was over.

"Yeah, definitely. I know the perfect position for you," the teenager told him with a nasty grin. _"The ball!"_ And both of them burst into hysterical laughter.

Or not, Gar thought, grinding his teeth.

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"I'm Jake," said one of the boys in a lazy drawl, pushing his ridiculously long hair out of his eyes. "And this is Jason. We're skaters."

"Good for you," said Victor coldly. He had taken an immediate dislike to his seatmates.

"So, dude, what're you?"

"Huh?"

"Social class, dude. What are you? Jock, nerd, prep, what?"

"I just got here. I'm not really sure." Okay, now they were really starting to get on his nerves.

"He's a jock," said the one called Jason.

"No way. He's a prep. See how he's ignoring us? He thinks he's too good for us. Typical prep."

"No way, man, look at him, he's a jock. He probably squats about a hundred." The boys continued their debate in their lazy voices. Victor finally couldn't take it anymore.

"Look, okay?" he snapped. "I'm not a jock, even though I like to play sports. And I'm not a prep. I'm ignoring you because you are _annoying. _Get it?"

Jake turned to Jason.

"See. I told you he was a prep."

"No way man, he's totally a jock…"

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"So, do you like Jesse McCartney or Aaron Carter?" asked Tiffany, holding up a picture of both.

"Neither."

"Do you like the color pink?" asked Stephanie.

"No."

"Do you have a cell phone?"

"Do you have a boyfriend?"

"Who do you think is hotter, Orlando Bloom or Johnny Depp?"

"_Here's _a question for you," snapped Raven, turning to each of them and trying extremely hard not to use her powers to blow up their purses. "Do you two ever stop talking?"

The two girls looked shocked for a moment. Then:

"How _rude!"_ scoffed Stephanie.

"Like, totally!" Tiffany agreed.

"Can you _believe_ how rude Goth chicks are?"

Raven groaned. It was going to be a long bus ride.

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"Hey there, hot stuff," one boy smirked. "When did you blow into town?"

"I did not 'blow' into town. I flew," Kori answered honestly.

"Funny, too," the other boy said. "Got a name?"

"Yes. My name is Kori. May I inquire to what your names are?"

"Sure…" The boys exchanged looks. This newcomer was pretty, but she talked funny. "I'm Tyler." The boy with slicked back black hair grinned at her.

"And I'm Johnny," the one with blond spikes told her.

"I am… pleased to meet you," Kori answered, trying to be as polite as possible and deeply wishing she were sitting with Dick instead of these two.

"Here's another question," Tyler smirked. "Got a boyfriend?"

_Uh-oh,_ Kori thought uncomfortably. Dick was not going to like this.

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Dick watched his friends over the top of his seat. Raven looked like she were about to explode while the two blondes on either side of her chattered nonstop. Poor Gar had disappeared, he'd sunk so low in his seat, but Dick could tell that he was having a miserable time because of the raucous laughter coming from the two football players he was forced to sit by. Vic looked bored out of his mind, trying to hide his frustration at the boys on either side of him, who seemed to be arguing. Kori looked very uncomfortable sandwiched between the popular boys. Dick flushed angrily, imaging what they were saying to her.

The hairs on Dick's arms and the back of his neck suddenly rose. He was being watched. Pretending to be looking for something in his backpack, Dick stole a sly glance around at the other kids sitting in the back. The Gothic kids, a boy and a girl, were talking quietly in the seat behind him. The only other person was a rather strange looking boy in seat fourteen, the one opposite Dick.

He was pale, which was odd, because his slight, athletic build suggested that he spent a lot of time in the sun playing sports. He was dressed in dark brown shirt with the band AC/DC on it and baggy black jeans. Curly, chocolate-colored hair fell down into his eyes, which were dark brown as well, and had a very serious look inside them. He had been studying Dick intently for the last few minutes, but when the boy's intense blue eyes had flickered briefly in his direction, he had quickly looked away.

Dick slid back down in his seat. There was something unsettling about the boy, especially in the way he had looked at Dick. Almost as though he had recognized him from somewhere. Dick certainly hoped not. He scooted down farther in his seat, looking determinedly out the window, and neither boy so much as glanced in the other's direction for the remainder of the trip.

After two more stops, the bus pulled into the school driveway. Dick climbed to his feet with the rest of the students and fought his way into the aisle. He wound up in front of the strange boy. Dick could feel his eyes on the back of his head until he got off the bus. Dick turned to take another look at the weird kid, but he had already vanished into the crowd.

"Dick! Over here!" called a familiar voice. Dick looked around and saw Vic's tall form looming over the head's of the other students, with Gar jumping up and down beside him, trying to get Dick's attention. Dick waved back and waded through the crowd to get to his friends.

"I don't know about you guys, but my bus ride _sucked,"_ said Gar immediately. "I _knew_ I'd get picked on! Those jocks kept making fun of my size."

"Those bubble-headed girls I was forced to sit with _never—shut—up!"_ Raven grouched through clenched teeth.

"I know what you mean," groaned Vic. "The guys I have to sit by are such losers. I'm not trying to be mean, I'm just tellin' the truth."

"I am also less than pleased with my seatmates," said Kori. "They seem quite nice, but they seem to be—I believe the Earth word for it is _flirting,_ is it not?"

"You're probably going to get a lot of that," Dick told her, another hot flush creeping up the back of his neck.

"So, who'd you get stuck by?" Gar asked him as they walked to homeroom, which, apparently, was their first period class.

"No one."

"Aw, _lucky!"_

"Actually, there was this one kid… He's kind of weird looking, and he kept looking at me funny. It was… disturbing, I guess."

"Dude, maybe he's—" Raven cut off Gar's sentence, knowing that his next word would be completely strange to Kori, which would lead to interesting complications.

"You don't think he recognizes you, do you?" asked Victor, looking down at Dick worriedly. "I don't see how; when we saw you this morning, the first thing I thought was that some kid had snuck into the—house." Thankfully, Vic caught himself before he said "Tower."

"I'm not sure," Dick murmured. "He did seem to recognize me from somewhere."

"Well, hopefully our disguises will protect us," said Raven.

"Hopefully will have to be good enough," Dick replied grimly, and they headed into class.


	5. Welcome To Jump City High

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

You guys have NO IDEA how much I'm appreciating the feedback. I'm really glad you all like the story. Special thanks to **acosta perez jose ramiro**, **FireDitto**, **Tefnut Talvi**, **TTforlife**, and **RoseXxxXThorn**. You guys rock! I hope you like these next two chapters. Enjoy!

Chapter 5:

Welcome to Jump City High

The first thing Dick noticed about Algebra/homeroom was that there was no apparent seating chart. Kids dumped their backpacks at the desk as close to the back as they could get and then went back into the hall to socialize. The five friends quickly found seats as close to each other as they could get. The girl Tiffany was in the class as well—with a groan, Raven pointed out her pink binder. Johnny was too, but seeing the glares Dick and Victor gave him, he chose a seat far away from Kori.

As the beginning of school ticked closer, more students began to filter through the classroom doors. Raven tapped Dick on the shoulder.

"Is that your friend over there?" she asked him in an undertone. Dick looked to where she was pointing. Leaning on the outside of the doorframe was the boy Dick had caught staring at him on the bus. The boy appeared to be looking for someone. Dick nodded.

"He does look a little strange," Raven noticed. She broke away from the group and headed toward him.

Raven wove her way through the other students until she came to the boy at the door.

"Excuse me," she said, her voice straining in an effort to sound both polite and friendly, neither characteristic for which she was famous. "Do you know when we're supposed to get our lockers?"

The boy jumped and looked at her. He clearly hadn't been expecting anyone to approach him. He turned and looked Raven in the eyes, and Raven gasped.

The boy's brown eyes were almost as intense as Dick's blue ones. They seemed to go right through Raven, meeting her gaze fearlessly and proudly. Like Dick's, his eyes seemed to harbor dark secrets, but they emanated a kind of power that could be physically felt. There was something ultimately strange about this boy.

"No," he told her, his voice like ice. He turned back to the hallway, letting her know without words that this was the end of the conversation. Raven decided not to push it, and returned to the others. Dick was waiting, his blue eyes round with anticipation.

"Well?" he asked her. Raven shrugged.

"There is something odd about him. I can't tell exactly. He's powerful."

"What do you mean?" Dick cocked his head to one side, a curious bird-like motion, like he always did when he was waiting for information.

"I mean, you can feel a sort of power when you're near him. Like when you stand next to Kori or Gar—a power you can't see, but is there nonetheless."

"Hmm…" Dick studied the back of the boy's head with new interest. He had no time to wonder about this new discovery, however, because just then the bell rang and the teacher walked in.

"You," she said, motioning to the boy at the door. "In here, now."

"But—"

"No buts!" she snapped, and he came in, giving her a glare out of the corner of his eye. He slid into the seat next to Dick, still glancing at the doorway and into the empty hallway. The teacher took a stand at the front of the class.

"My name is Mrs. Underwood. I will be your Algebra teacher for the school year. As I am sure you know, there are many rules and procedures that you are required to know and that I am required to teach you on the first day. Before we get started, I'm going to call roll." She glanced at her clipboard. "Allen, Raven?"

"Here."

"Anders, Kori?"

"Present," Kori answered, just as Dick had instructed her to.

"Andrews, Curtis?"

She wound her way down the list, passing Dick's name, and students from all over the room called out whether or not they were there.

"Logan, Garfield?" A couple of kids sniggered. Gar flushed.

"Here," he muttered. "I go by Gar."

"I will try to remember that, Gar. Marshall, Logan?"

"Here." Dick turned; it was the strange, curly-haired boy. Logan Marshall suddenly realized that Dick was looking at him. He returned Dick's look, and Dick turned away. Mrs. Underwood had already called at least seven more students.

"Stone, Victor?"

"Right here!" Vic answered with a grin.

"Thompson, Ashley?"

"Here," replied a quiet voice from the doorway. Just about everyone jumped and looked toward the source; a girl had just walked in. She walked over to Mrs. Underwood and handed her a slip of paper.

"Hmm," she said, studying it. "Ashley Thompson. Being tardy is not exactly the best way to start off the school year."

"I know. I was—delayed." She flicked a strand of her blonde ponytail over her shoulder. Logan Marshall sat up a little straighter, his eyes narrowed.

"Very well. Please, take your seat." Ashley walked over to Logan, and he grabbed a binder, clearly his own, that had been holding the seat for her. She sat down next to him with a grin. Logan leaned toward her. Dick listened intently to their whispered conversation.

"You took your time. Where were you?" Logan muttered.

"I ran into a little trouble. Nothing I couldn't handle."

"You don't need to be doing anything dangerous until we've had a look around. Gotten to know the lay of the city."

"Relax," Ashley smirked. "Those guys didn't know what hit them."

"What happened?"

"I'll tell you later," she whispered, suddenly realizing that Mrs. Underwood, who had finished calling roll, was glaring at them. The two friends sat up and gave their full attention to her. Dick, realizing that the conversation had ended, sat back to listen as Mrs. Underwood launched into her start-of-the-school-year speech.

After the teacher finally wound down (it was clear she hated the speech as much as the students did), Mrs. Underwood started with some basic multiplication to get the students warmed up. While they did that, she assigned math books. She then assigned lockers. The students were able to pick their locker partners. Dick and Gar paired up, as did Kori and Raven. Vic got one of his own. The period passed much quicker after that, in more or less silence. When the bell finally rang, Dick gathered his things together, thinking that first period hadn't been that bad at all. It had certainly given him a lot to think about.

Dick bade farewell to Kori and Gar, and headed off to Advanced Language Arts with Victor and Raven. The other two headed off to separate classes.

Advanced Language Arts turned out to be a class for the elite. There were only about thirteen of them in there, the blonde Ashley Thompson being one of them. She chose a seat near a pair of twin boys, on the other side of the room. Dick looked around curiously, surprised at how small the class was.

"Hey, kids!" Mr. Killingsworth, the teacher, exclaimed as he hurried into the room. "Sorry I'm a little late—my first period class is on the other side of the school. It's really quite astonishing how big this place is. You wouldn't know it by looking at it, would you?"

Dick decided immediately that he liked this teacher. All throughout the period, Mr. Killingsworth joked around. He skipped the start-of-year speech, too. Instead, he got them to sit around the floor in a circle, with a stuffed soccer ball in the middle.

"Okay," he said, holding up the ball. "I'm going to throw this at one of you."

"Abuse!" shouted one of the twin boys. It really wasn't all that funny, but Mr. Killingsworth laughed.

"Not intentionally, but if I hit you on the head, be sure to bring a helmet tomorrow just in case. Anyway, I'm going to throw this at one of you. You're going to catch it, tell us what your name is and something interesting about yourself. Heads up!"

He threw the ball to an African American girl with a long braid of thick black hair.

"My name is Cicely Jones, and I have six younger siblings." She aimed the ball for one of the twins, and both caught it.

"I'm Colin," said one.

"And I'm Cole," the other said immediately afterward. Then, together, "We're twins, and we can read each other's minds."

"Not really," said Colin.

"But since we think so much alike—" Cole started.

"It's hard to tell that we don't," finished Colin.

"You know what I learned about them?" Victor whispered to Dick. "They're spazzes." Dick grinned; their rapid-fire speech and uncanny ability to finish each other's sentences reminded him of Mas Y Menos.

The twin named Cole made a big deal of scouting out the next person before making a dramatic pass to Ashley beside him. Giggling, she caught it.

"I'm Ashley Thompson," she said, her blue eyes sparking. "And I have an _electric _personality." She looked around the room, and, catching Dick's eye, threw it to him.

"My name is Dick Grayson," he said, catching it. Ashley stiffened suddenly, but Dick did not see it. "And, uh…my favorite food is pizza."

"Amen!" shouted Colin, and he bounded over to Dick, his hand outstretched for a high-five. While the rest of the class buckled with laughter, Dick gave it to him and, grinning, threw the ball at Victor.

"I'm Victor Stone, and my favorite sport is football!"

"I'm Raven Allen. Don't get on my bad side."

"I'm Kate Pritchard, and I have seven cats!"

And so on and so on. The game passed relatively quickly, seeing as there were only fourteen people in the room. The ball was finally passed to the last person in the circle, Mr. Killingsworth.

"My name is Kevin Killingsworth," he stated, "and I am here to provide you with an education. And with that in mind…" He sprang up, ushered them back to their seats, and passed out paperback books. "I would like you all to read pages one through thirty in _The Tempest_. We'll be reading it aloud all through the week, and at the end, I want you to write an essay about whether or not the statement at the end of the book makes sense."

"Which would be….?" asked Victor.

"Whether or not the whole thing was really the dream of a higher being. You can find evidence all throughout the story."

There was more than one pair of raised eyebrows in the room, but they had no time to dwell on it, because Mr. Killingsworth immediately gave them parts and had them read aloud. Dick only halfway focused on the book. He was lost in thought, wondering how Gar and Kori were doing.


	6. A Little More Class

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Chapter 6:

A little more class

The man in History class would have been better suited as a drill sergeant than a teacher. Actually, judging by his bulging muscles, dark crew cut, and dog tags, Gar was pretty sure he had been. The first major thing that gave him this clue was that when the teacher walked into the classroom and saw a majority of the students sitting down, he roared, "Did I tell you that you could sit down?"

The wide-eyed stares of his students told him that they hadn't had any idea that they were supposed to ask for permission. They stood up immediately and waited beside their desks.

"My name is Mr. Tatum," he told them in the authoritive bark. Not unlike Robin when he ordered the team out, Gar mused. Only Robin had a friendly side. This man, clearly, did not. "You will all address me by that name, or you will call me 'sir.' Is that clear?" There was muttering throughout the class. "I said, IS THAT CLEAR?"

"Yes, sir, Mr. Tatum, sir!" Gar answered, thinking that this was what the teacher expected. Unfortunately for Garfield Logan, it wasn't.

"Do you think you are being funny, maggot?" shouted Mr. Tatum, striding over to Gar and gripping the sides of his desk harder than was necessary. Gar didn't answer. "When I ask a question, I expect you to answer it! Now, do it!"

"No, sir, I was not trying to be funny," Gar answered, somewhere between pure loathing and fear of being torn apart. Of course, if it came to that, he could take this guy hands down, but Dick would kill him for it. Mr. Tatum, disappointed that the boy had not responded with a smart mouth, got extremely close to Gar's face. His breath ruffled the boy's light brown hair.

"What's your name, maggot?" he growled.

"Gar."

"Gar what?"

"Gar-_field_."

"Garfield _what?"_

"Garfield Logan."

"Well, Logan, I'm watching you," Tatum snarled. "You might want to be more careful in the future."

"Yes, sir." Tatum let go of the desk and strode to the front of the room and called roll. Tatum finished that quickly and stood facing his students. Every single one of them knew better than to speak.

"Let me get one thing straight with all of you," he said, slowly and surprisingly quiet. "I am the boss of you. While you are in this classroom, you will do what I say, when I say it. First of all, do not talk unless I address you. Second, raise your hand. Third, stay in your seat and complete all of your assignments. Fourth, you have to ask my permission before you do anything. Follow those rules and we'll get along fine." He stood expectantly. No one else said anything. This went on for at least three minutes. Some of the others began to fidget. Gar watched the clock as the second hand ticked around the face lazily. Finally, after a moment of visible hesitation, a slight redhead sitting beside Gar spoke up: "Permission to sit down, sir?"

"Permission granted," Tatum smirked. The redhead looked relieved, and everyone was allowed to sit down. Tatum launched straight into his start-of-school speech. He, unlike Mrs. Underwood, seemed to think it was extremely important that the ground rules be laid, and made them take notes from the board. They worked in silence. Or, mostly silence, until someone caused Gar to break it.

Gar was writing down something to do with lunchroom procedures when a wet, sticky spitball attached itself to the back of his neck. He wiped it off, making a sound of disgust, and turned to see who had thrown it. A boy in a leather jacket was sitting directly behind Gar, smirking and holding a straw. He even looked like a bully; with spiked black hair that was nothing like Robin's and an ugly grin. He gave Gar a "What are _you_ going to do about it?" look, and put another wad of paper into his mouth.

"Cut it out," Gar muttered, and turned back around. Another spitball found its way into his hair, and he shook it out. There were a few sniggers from the back of the room. Mr. Tatum turned around and glared, and the room fell silent again. Once the teacher's back was turned, Gar hissed, "Quit it." He was starting to get really angry. His skin trembled, and he had to concentrate hard to keep himself from morphing into a gorilla and smashing the kid's face in. One more spitball was the straw that broke the camel's back. "I SAID STOP IT!" Gar yelled, standing up to face the bully so suddenly he upset his chair. There was an "Ooooh," from the rest of the class, and Gar suddenly found out why. A heavy hand clamped down on his shoulder and spun him around.

"Logan! What did I just get through telling you maggots?"

"But sir, he—"

"Quiet! I did not give you permission to talk, Logan!"

"Uh,_ yeah,_ you did!" Gar snapped. "You asked me a question! Earlier you bit my head off for not answering, and now you're telling me to shut up! Make up your mind already!"

Gar knew that he might as well have triggered a bomb, and Mr. Tatum looked very nearly like he was going to explode.

"Front of the class! NOW!" he barked, and steered Gar to the front. "Drop and give me fifty!"

"Huh?"

"You heard me! Fifty push-ups! NOW!"

Bewildered, Gar dropped to the floor and did fifty push-ups. _It could be worse,_ he told himself. Robin made them train so much that Gar practically did an average of fifty push-ups every day. The boy finished quickly. _That wasn't so bad._

And then Tatum, deciding that Gar had done them too fast, made him do fifty more.

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Kori wasn't faring much better in Language Arts. To her utter dismay, both Tyler and Johnny were in the class, and seeing that Victor and Dick were nowhere around, they had wasted no time in grabbing seats by her. Unfortunately, this did not sit well with Tiffany and Stephanie, who apparently were Tyler and Johnny's girlfriends.

The teacher, Josephine Burton, was a cranky old witch who hated students. The first thing she said to them was, "Sit down, you hooligans!" Everyone sat, amidst snickers and whispers. Kori, confused, raised her hand.

"Excuse me, Mrs. Burton," she inquired meekly. "Could you please tell me what you mean by the word 'hooligans?'" Mrs. Burton scowled at her.

"If you don't know what a hooligan is, you might as well go back to sixth grade!" she snapped. "Honestly, they'll let just about anyone pass these days. I'm sure there are only about four of you who are actually competent for this class!"

Kori, for one, felt extremely insulted, because Dick had told her she was doing quite well. She kept her hand and head down for the rest of the class, in which Mrs. Burton called roll, shouted a little more, and then gave them an assignment dealing with nouns and verbs. Kori, suddenly very glad Dick had thought to brief her in the subject, finished quickly and got most of them right. Mrs. Burton scowled as she checked over her paper, handing it back with a large red A on it. Kori felt a sort of rebellious pride well up inside her. _Who is the hooligan now?_

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When the bell rang, the five friends met up outside the freshmen hallway.

"Advanced Language Arts isn't too bad," Dick admitted. "The teacher's a little out there, but he's pretty cool."

"Yeah. There are some cute girls in there, too," grinned Victor. Raven rolled her eyes.

"Mr.—Tatum—is—evil!" Gar snarled.

"Who?"

"Tatum, the History teacher! He's insane! I got into trouble, and—"

"Gar! You couldn't have already gotten a detention!" Dick scolded.

"Detention! The guy doesn't _give_ detention! He hauled me to the front of the class and made me do a hundred push-ups! _One hundred push-ups!"_

"My teacher is what I believe you would call a troll," said Kori. "She called us 'hooligans.' Please, what is a hooligan?"

"It's—" Dick was cut off by the bell, and they broke apart, Raven, Kori, and Victor to History, and Dick and Gar to Spanish.

"How much longer to lunch?" Gar groaned, flopping into his chair. Dick slid into the seat beside him.

"Not sure," he answered.

_"Silencio!" _the teacher commanded. No one in the class needed a translation to know that she had just told them to shut up. She, too, went into a speech about the beginning of school, but most of it was in rapid Spanish, and looking around, Dick could see that he and Gar weren't the only ones that had no idea what she was saying. Dick watched the clock anxiously, suddenly wishing very hard that lunch would hurry up.

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Kori, Victor, and Raven had a much more eventful class period.

Mr. Tatum greeted the class in much the same way as he had greeted his first two periods. And all his constant yelling ticked Raven off. After he shouted at Kori for asking a question, Raven finally decided it was time for payback. Poor Kori had slid down in her seat, on the point of tears. Raven waited until the drill sergeant teacher had reached the front of the room, and then, with a subtle flick of her finger and a whisper of "Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" caused a ceiling tile to split and fall right onto Mr. Tatum's head.

The class howled with laughter, while Mr. Tatum ducked and screamed, "We're under attack! Everybody to the bomb shelter!" Which, of course, made the class laugh twice as hard.

"Thank you, Raven," Kori smiled at her. "That was most satisfying."

"No problem."

"You might wanna watch it, Raven," Vic muttered. "Dick's gonna have a cow."

"Dick is going to want to do the exact same thing to this guy after he's had him. Think of this as me getting revenge for all of us."


	7. Joey

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Special shoutouts to **AyamiLee**, **xoRuthox** (of course I'll read your story—I'm just observing Lent right now and I'm kind of on a fiction-fast, so I'm not actively reading anything, so after Easter I'll drop by), **acosta perez jose ramiro**, **Tefnut Talvi**, **Sunset15**, and **FireDitto. **You guys are AMAZING, and I can't thank you enough.

So…. Last night I had a weird dream in which someone said they hated Joey and that I should take him out. I really hope you guys like him; I'm extraordinarily fond of the little guy. Ah, whatever, I'll let you meet him yourself. Heeeeeeeeere's Joey!

One other note: Stephen's name is pronounced "Steffen," not "Steven." Now you can read it.

Chapter 7:

Joey

Dick and Gar couldn't get out of Spanish fast enough. As soon as the bell rang, they were out the door and gone, trying to find the cafeteria.

"Any idea where it is?" Dick asked his friend.

"I can find out," Gar grinned, and lifted his nose into the air. He took a few thoughtful sniffs, and then jerked his head to the left. "This way."

"How'd you do that?"

"I'm part animal, remember?" Gar told him quietly.

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"I do not seem to be able to find our friends," said Kori, resisting the urge to hover above the heads of the students for a better look.

"Well, how hard can it be?" shrugged Victor. "A short green kid and a spiky-haired little twerp. They can't be that hard to spot."

"Except Gar isn't green, and Dick didn't put spikes in his hair today," snapped Raven.

"Oh, yeah. What do they look like again?"

"Look for a boy with black hair that sticks up in the back a little, wearing a white T-shirt and jeans, and for a tan kid with short, spiked brown hair, wearing dark green cargo shorts and a blue shirt with a shark logo on it."

"I see the Ashley and Logan. They are most strange, are they not?"

"Yep, total weirdo's," said Victor "Do you see our weirdo's?"

"Oh, so now we're weirdo's, are we?" asked a voice behind him. Vic turned around and looked down—there were Dick and Gar, smirking.

"Nah, I'm just playing. Y'all aren't weirdoes."

"No," grinned Dick. "Apparently, I'm a spiky-haired little twerp."

"And you've been standing there for how long?"

"Long enough. Come on, I could eat a cow."

"I resent that!" Gar declared. The five of them scrambled into line.

The lunch line couldn't have moved slower if it was going backwards. And once they had their trays, they weren't certain if it was even worth the wait. There was some sort of pinkish orange goop on their plates, with applesauce and what could possibly be carrots in similar piles. Dick, Kori, Gar, Raven and Vic all headed to an empty table and plopped down.

"Whatever this is," Gar grunted, "I'm positive it isn't vegetarian."

"I don't think it's meat, either. Maybe somewhere in between." Victor gave his tray a shake. The unidentified substance jiggled like Jell-O.

"I think I'll just starve," Raven muttered, pushing her tray away.

"The applesauce isn't that bad," Dick told her, spooning some into his mouth. Very soon afterward, he gagged and spat it out into his napkin. "Never mind."

"I think it is most wonderful!" exclaimed Kori. "It tastes like the gor'man'dur of my home world. I wonder how to go about preparing it at home?"

"If you fix this at home, I'm moving out," said Raven in a deadly serious voice.

Everyone except Kori stared at their plates moodily, wondering whether it would be safer to skip lunch or to eat the food. For a few minutes there was silence. Then suddenly Dick made a noise of revulsion somewhere in his throat.

"What is it?" asked Raven.

"It moved," he said through gritted teeth.

"What moved?" Gar leaned over to take a closer look.

"The glob. I poked it, and it moved."

"_Ew!_ Do it again!"

"What? _Why_?"

"Because I want to see it!" Everyone clustered around Dick's plate as he gave his lunch another tentative poke. It wiggled.

"Oh, man, that's the nastiest thing I've ever seen. It makes Plasmus look like…. well, it's uglier than Plasmus, and that's pretty dang ugly."

"Moving cafeteria food. This place just continues to amaze me," Raven muttered, sitting back and folding her arms.

"O-_kay_, I've totally lost _my_ appetite." Dick pushed the tray away.

The bell rang.

"Dude, we just sat down!" Gar pouted.

"It's not like we were eating anyway."

"Easy for you to say. You've got cooking next. You'll get to bake cookies and stuff." The five friends rose from their seats and carried their trays to the window that opened into the kitchen. A surly woman in a hairnet and protective gloves was dumping the trays into the sink.

"We're probably just getting the speech again. And we'll get it in the next class, and the next class, and the next class—oh, no." Dick suddenly went white. "Oh, crap. Hide me!" He ducked behind Victor, who looked just as bewildered as the other three.

"Um, did I miss something?" he asked.

"Look at the door," Dick muttered, peeking around Vic's shirt. "That crowd of girls coming in. Look at the blonde in the pink sweater."

"What, I still don't see—oh." He grinned wickedly, feeling only a little sorry for his friend.

"Who is it?" Gar demanded.

"Kitten."

"You mean that chick who forced you to go to the prom with her? She goes _here?"_

"Yep," smirked Raven. "Life stinks for you, Dick. I give you my sympathy."

"Shut up."

Dick made sure to keep Vic's side facing _away_ from the oncoming students. Kitten flounced past with her group of preppies, tossing her blonde hair like she owned the place. Dick craned his neck to look at them.

"Come on, come on—_yes! _Thank you _God!_ She's at least two grades up!"

"How do you figure?"

"The guys around her have varsity football jackets from last year and the year before. I have nothing to fear from that little—"

"Watch it," said Raven, her eyes flashing dangerously. "We don't need to give Kori a vocab lesson if you lose control of your mouth."

"I wonder if her boyfriend goes here," said Gar aloud.

"Yeah, like they're really going to let a guy with a spider fused to his head in a public high school."

"You mean Fang?" inquired a voice from behind them. The five friends spun around to see a very short and skinny redheaded boy standing behind them. He was even shorter than Gar, and _that_ was tiny. "I think he's still in jail. Kitten got out of juvenile hall during May. Her dad bailed her out. But Fang's still in prison. My sister told me."

"And you would be…?"

"I'm Joey Harper!" he exclaimed, grinning widely. His brown eyes lit up and his freckles popped out. "I just wanted to talk to Garfield for a second."

"Um, okay." Dick felt awkward at leaving his friend alone, but seeing as he still needed to find the Home Ec. room, he said goodbye to Gar and he and the others went off to their classes.

"Hi, Joey." Gar studied this new individual for a moment. "Hey, aren't you in my History class?"

"Yep." The boy bobbed his head up and down rapidly. "I just wanted to say it was really cool the way you stood up to Tatum. I never would have had the guts to do it."

"Thanks…. although I really think it was more stupidity than guts." Joey giggled, his voice rather shrill for a fourteen-year-old boy.

"What class do you have next?" he asked, setting off down the hall. Gar walked beside him.

"Art."

"Wow, me too! I really like to draw. Do you?"

"I'm not really all that good—"

"Come on! We're going to be late!" The tiny boy grabbed Gar by the wrist and dragged him down the hallway much faster than he looked like he would be. Gar went willingly, bewildered and strangely pleased. He'd obviously found a friend.

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Home Ec. was every bit as disastrous as Dick thought it would be. A majority of the class were girls, which was enough to make any boy uncomfortable. The teacher was extremely cold to the boys, seeming to favor the girls. The start of term speech was short and sweet: "Do what I say and we'll get along fine." She then talked them through turning on the oven. Dick was exceedingly nervous—he was a horrible cook. He could fry eggs, make toast and pour cereal, and that was just about as far as his expertise went. He'd cooked a ham once, but Cyborg had coached him through it. Last Thanksgiving Dick had managed to blow up the microwave, which also blew out the entire wall. Vic still teased him about it mercilessly. Dick had a horrible feeling that something very bad was going to happen at some point during the year, and, undoubtedly, something very embarrassing.

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Gar and Joey sat in Art class, watching the teacher, Mrs. Rachel, sketch an outline of each teen in the room on the board.

"See?" she asked when she'd finished. "Anyone can draw! During this class, I will not be teaching you to create art. I will be helping you unleash the creative genius in your souls!"

Gar groaned inwardly. He'd met supervillains less nutty than this woman.

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The first thing Raven noticed about her Drama class was that Ashley Thompson was in it. The blonde flashed Raven a smile before scampering away. The room was full of chattering teenagers, an equal mix of boys and girls.

The second thing that Raven noticed was that this class was going to be collapsing into laughter at random moments, because their unfortunate teacher's name was Mrs. Sir.

"Quiet, children, quiet!" Mrs. Sir called out over the din, after about three minutes of letting the teenagers laugh hysterically. "We must have order if we want to be professionals!" Once she got everyone quieted down, she cleared her throat and went on. "Welcome to the theatre! It is a little known fact that the theatre is actually an art, a fine and perfected art passed down since before the days of the Greek. To keep the spirit of art alive, you all will be participating in a performance this year. Whether by making sets, operating the lights, or doing the actual acting, every single one of you is an important asset to this department."

_There is no possible way that you are getting me on stage,_ Raven thought darkly.

"This year, we will have two performances, the first of which will be the greatest of Shakespeare's tragedies, _Hamlet."_

Raven blinked. She'd expected a musical full of frilly dresses and cheesy songs. _Well, then, maybe you will._

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The band teacher was a jerk. This became quite apparent to Kori during the very first lesson. After assigning instruments, he placed them in chairs like an orchestra. Kori found herself playing the flute and sitting directly next to Logan Marshall, who said nothing. Mr. Wess, the teacher, showed them the basic ways of operating each instrument, and ordered them to warm up. Bewildered, the students put their trumpets, flutes, and clarinets to their mouths and blew. The cacophony that erupted was stupendous.

"No, no, no!" Mr. Wess snapped, waving his wand to cut them off. "You must not play the instrument! Let it play you!"

"How are we—" Kori raised her hand to ask, but Logan grabbed her wrist and brought her arm back down.

"Don't ask anything," he muttered, his brown eyes glaring beneath his curls. "I've heard that Wess can get nasty."

"Oh," Kori whispered back. "Thank you very much, friend Logan." She wasn't sure, but she thought she saw a smile break through the grim shell and flicker across his face for half a moment.

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The five Titans met up outside the gym right before the period was due to start.

"Computers was a breeze," smirked Victor. "I could've slept through it."

"Good for you," growled Dick. "I hate Home Ec. already. I'm going to make something explode, I just know it. Who was your new friend, Gar?"

"That's Joey. He's cool. I think he has ADHD or something; he's really hyperactive. He spent half of the last period bouncing up and down in his chair."

"That's…annoying," said Raven. "We're going to be doing _Hamlet _in Drama. Dark and depressing—my kind of stuff."

"The Logan Marshall is really quite nice," Kori admitted. "But the teacher is almost as horrible as Mr. Tatum."

_"Nobody_ can be as horrible as Mr. Tatum," Gar growled. "It's genetically impossible."

A whistle blew, and all the students who happened to have Gym at the time ran together in a sort of mob in front of a very tall coach.

"OK. There's really not much any of you need to know about Gym class," he told them, twirling a basketball. "At the first of the period, you warm up—stretches, jumping jacks, sit-ups, the works. Then you run two laps around the football field, and then the rest of the period is yours to do whatever, as long as it's athletic. You will be expected to dress out, in T-shirts and shorts or sweatpants and appropriate shoes. Now, go outside and goof off for a little while."

"I'll catch you guys later," Vic told them. "I wanna ask this guy about football tryouts."

"See you," said Dick, and they followed the crowd. The students flocked to the football field, climbing down a steep incline to get to the smooth grassy surface.

The four of them walked around the football field, talking about normal stuff when there were other groups of walkers nearby, but once they were out of earshot, the talk turned to something else.

"Can you believe that the alarm hasn't gone off all day?" Gar moaned. "And it probably won't. We'll be stuck here--_all day!"_

"There's only three periods left, Gar."

"Big flippin' deal. I just don't get why somebody hasn't tried to rob a bank or just go on a mindless destruction trip. Mumbo, the H.I.V.E, Cinderblock, _anyone!_ So far the only villain we've seen is your girlfriend, Dick."

"Call her my girlfriend one more time, and I will skin you and use your pelt as the living room rug."

"Ouch, that sounds like it would hurt!" said a familiar, chipper voice. The four whirled around and sure enough, there was Joey, pushing his floppy red hair out of his eyes.

"How long have you been standing there?" snapped Raven. A tree branch overhead began to shake violently. Dick touched her arm in a warning gesture. The shaking stopped.

"Just long enough for the girlfriend quip. I've been looking all over for Gar."

"I'm kinda hanging with my friends right now, but you can join us, if that's okay." Gar looked to the others for answers. Dick shrugged, Kori smiled and nodded, and Raven just glared.

"Cool! I don't think I've met them." Joey bobbed up and down enthusiastically. He seemed totally incapable of standing still.

"Oh, right. This is Kori—"

"Greetings, Joey!" Kori beamed.

"Dick—"

"Hey." He treated the small boy to a welcome grin.

"And Raven."

Raven merely nodded.

The rest of the period was spent talking about classes and homework and other stuff, and watching the kids who had gotten together and were playing football and other sports. Dick was halfway tempted to go and join a game of football, but he decided against it. They stopped about halfway around the field to allow Vic to catch up with them, made the proper introductions, and then stood around watching a soccer game. It wasn't as much a game as organized chaos, but one player stood out.

Ashley Thompson was tearing her way across the field, chasing the ball. Her long blonde ponytail streamed out behind her like a banner. She side-tackled a kid on the other team and stole the ball, fighting her way to the front of the pack, and gave the ball a ferocious kick. The goalie leaped, arms outstretched, but the ball sailed straight into the upper left corner.

"Whoa," said Dick, impressed. "She's good."

"Yeah," Gar agreed, craning his neck to get a better look at her as her teammates clustered around her. "Does she look familiar to you?"

"You know, she sort of _does,"_ said Vic. "But I can't think of who."

"We've probably seen her around town before," shrugged Raven. "No big deal."

"I've never seen her before," piped Joey, hopping up and down for no apparent reason. "And I've seen most of the kids around here before. Most of them went to my middle school, Perry Middle. Like you guys. You're new, 'cause you didn't go to my school."

"No, we didn't—okay, you can stop that now." Dick couldn't fight back a smile at Joey's hyperactivity. Kori put a hand on top of Joey's head and pushed down. He stopped.

"Wow," he mumbled. "You're strong."

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When the bell rang and the students began the trek up the hill, Joey scrambled away, saying that his next class was on the other side of the school.

"I believe we have made friends with the Joey," smiled Kori.

"No," said Dick. "I think he made friends with us. He's not a can-I-be-your-friend person; he's an I'm-going-to-be-your-friend person. There's no fighting him."

"You know, I like the little guy," mused Vic.

"Me too," Gar agreed. Raven glowered.

"I'll tolerate him, but he's irritating. I don't like the way he just randomly pops up behind us like that. And he's so hyper—I can _feel_ the energy he lets off."

A bell rang.

"Oh, crap, we'd better hurry!" exclaimed Dick, breaking into a run. "C'mon, Gar! See you guys later!" Together they sprinted toward the school and rushed off to Biology.

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Mr. Abbot seemed nice enough, but he was strict. Dick and Gar could tell that immediately as they slid into their seats. Ashley Thompson sat down a few seats away, and Dick noticed that every once in awhile Gar would glance over in her direction.

Dick pulled out a scrap of paper and a pencil and scribbled, _Dude, you're staring. _He passed the note discreetly to Gar, who read it and wrote back, _I can't help it. She looks so familiar; it's driving me crazy._

_And you think she's cute._

_Dude, I know a hot girl when I see one._

"Ahem," said Mr. Abbot from the front of the room. "I will thank you boys not to pass notes in my class. Please put that away."

"Yes, sir," they mumbled, and the note was slipped into Gar's pocket. Ashley tossed her ponytail and glanced in their direction. She smiled at Gar, who smiled back in a stupid kind of way, and she took a quick look at Dick. Dick got an uncomfortable feeling from that look—the same quick, furtive glance that Logan had given him, as if they recognized Dick. He really, _really_ didn't like that.

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Dick didn't get to talk to the others before he hurried off to History, but judging by the looks on their faces as they passed it had not been a fun period. He gave them a grin as the kid behind him shoved Dick to keep moving.

Because he'd had the warning from Gar and the others, Dick knew not to sit down. So, apparently, had many of the others, because very few people were sitting. There was one boy with crutches sitting down, and next to him was Logan Marshall, standing. Dick placed his books on the desk on the boy's other side and stood waiting.

"You might want to get up," he said to the boy at his side. The kid looked up, peering at Dick through hazel eyes.

"Why?" he asked.

"The teacher is going to come in here in a second and yell at us for sitting down."

"Huh," the boy mused. "First I've heard of it. Thanks." The boy grabbed his crutches and pulled himself to his feet. Dick noticed with a shock that when the kid stood up, there was a bump in his spine. "Yeah, I know, I'm a hunchback," he said, catching Dick's stare. "Go ahead and look; everyone else has."

"Oh, jeez, I'm sorry," Dick stuttered. "I—I didn't know."

"It's okay. I was born with this degenerative disease, and this is kind of what happened."

"Man," breathed Dick. "That's terrible."

"Yeah, it stinks sometimes, but I'm used to it. You know what the worst part is? People treat me like I'm some sort of doll or something. They talk quietly and play nice because they think I'll break."

"Wow. That's pretty rough." Dick noticed that he had been talking quietly and raised his voice a little, wondering if the kid had pointed it out especially. "I'm Dick Grayson, by the way."

"Stephen Harrow." Stephen adjusted his weight on his crutches to shake Dick's hand. Just then, the teacher came in.

"Did I tell you maggots you could—" He stopped in mid-shout and looked around the room. A few kids sniggered at his surprise. No one was sitting down. "Oh, good. This class isn't as green as the others. That makes things easier." Mr. Tatum called roll and did the routine the other classes had received, but the wind seemed to have been taken out of his sails after finding no reason to yell at his students. He looked even more blustered when, after giving his ground rules, Dick immediately called out, "Permission to sit, sir?" Unfortunately, that made Tatum angry, and he stomped over to Dick.

"You think you're pretty smart, there, don't you, boy?" he growled. "What's your name?"

"Dick Grayson, sir."

"Grayson. I'll be keeping my eye on you." He turned to go to the front, but then he noticed Stephen leaning on his crutches. "Stand up straight, maggot! Soldiers don't slouch!"

"Excuse me for saying so, sir," said Stephen quietly, "but I am standing up as straight as I can, and the last time I checked, this was a high school, not a boot camp. We are not fly larvae or soldiers; we are students."

Dick's eyes widened in surprise and admiration for Stephen's guts. Logan, on Stephen's other side, seemed to be fighting back a triumphant grin. Mr. Tatum, however, didn't seem to find this admirable.

"I don't tolerate 'I can't's' in this classroom, maggot! Now stand up straight!"

"Sir," explained Stephen calmly, ignoring the fact that Mr. Tatum had gone beet red. "When I say that I can't do something, it is not because I am giving up because the task looks intimidating. I am telling you that what I can't do is a physical impossibility. Due to my present condition, I am not able to stand up straight. There has never been a time when I could stand up straight, and there will probably never be a time when I can stand up straight. Now that I have said my piece, may we please sit down?"

Dick seriously hoped that this was the end of the conversation, because Tatum's persistence on Stephen was really starting to tick him off. The kid has a physical disability. Surely Tatum could understand that?

"Maggot, you are going to stand straight like a military man or you are going to the office!"

"HE CAN'T!!!!!"

Dick blinked—he hadn't been the only one who shouted. Looking to Stephen's other side, he could see Logan Marshall, his normally pale face flushed in anger, glaring at Tatum through his mass of curly hair.

Mr. Tatum looked like he was about to explode.

"Front of the class! Both of you! Everyone else, sit!" He was obeyed at once, and Dick and Logan followed him to the front.

"Let me guess," said Dick.

"You want us to do fifty push-ups?" asked Logan, not trying to keep the scorn out of his voice. Dick blinked again—he had been about to say that.

"No," snarled Tatum, seeing that they were not intimidated. There was something about these boys, much like Garfield Logan, that defied his command and scorned his authority. It infuriated him. "I want you to do one hundred! Now!"

The boys finished at the exact same time, neither even breaking much of a sweat. Dick did a hundred push-ups everyday anyway. How Logan had managed to do it was beyond Dick. They stood shoulder-to-shoulder, giving Tatum fearless glares.

"Well, since you two don't seem to be very impressed by the push-ups, you'll be attending detention tomorrow," Tatum snapped.

"That's not—" Dick started

"Detention, maggot! Now sit!" Both boys threw Tatum furious glances before stalking back to their seats. Logan caught Dick's eye, and he looked up to the ceiling, the expression on his face clearly saying, _Jeez._ Dick nodded in an exasperated kind of way: _I know what you mean._ The slid into their seats beside Stephen, who gave a thankful grin to them both. Dick was too ticked off to notice.

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Dick trudged off to his locker after the bell dismissed them from History. Gar was already there, apparently having difficulties opening it.

"Come on, come on already!" he muttered through gritted teeth. Finally he slammed his fist against it, frustrated, and shouted, "Fine! Be that way, you stupid hunk of metal!"

"Need any help?" asked Raven, coming up behind them.

"Please," Dick replied. Gar gave her the combination and she twiddled the knob, pretending to unlock the locker. But Dick saw for a brief moment that her hand glowed black, and there was a click.

"There," she said with a smirk.

"Thanks," Dick muttered, stowing his books inside and grabbing his backpack.

"How were your classes?"

"Kori was right," Gar said immediately. "That Burton woman is a _troll_. I think she and Mr. Tatum must be related—or married."

"Tatum was just as bad as you said he was," said Dick with a sigh. "He gave me a detention."

"_You_ got a detention?" asked Gar, his mouth dropping open.

"Yeah—me and Logan Marshall. We talked back to him, so he made us do a hundred push-ups, and when we were done he gave us both detention."

"I'm sorry, but…._ haha!" _Gar pointed and laughed. "You got detention with the creepy kid!"

"He's weird, but he's not really all that creepy." Dick shouldered his backpack. "Oh," he added in an undertone to Raven, "normally I'm totally against this, but I'll make an exception this time. Next time you drop something on Tatum, make it the overhead."

"What makes you think it was me that dropped the ceiling tile on him?"

"Did I _say_ you dropped a ceiling tile on him? _No_, but thank you for confirming my suspicions." Raven scowled, realizing her blunder.

"Come on," she growled. "The way today is going, it'll be just our luck if we miss the bus."

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They met up with Vic and Kori in the bus lane, but they really didn't have time to talk. Once they boarded, they all trudged off to their different seats. Dick threw his backpack moodily into the seat before sitting down, his knees up against the seat in front of him. The school year had already taken a horrible start. He was isolated from his friends on the bus. The cafeteria food had its own genus and species. Kitten went to this school, so he would be constantly ducking and dodging into classrooms to avoid her. The Spanish teacher was a witch, he hated Home Ec., and he would love nothing more than to stuff Mr. Tatum's head down the toilet—or give him a good round with his Bo staff. He'd gotten a detention the very first day, and with a kid he wasn't even sure he liked yet. Dick sank down farther in his seat, and his stomach let out a loud growl. He hadn't eaten a full meal all day. No, he realized. Longer than all day. He'd skipped dinner the night before. Dick scowled; it would be just his luck if he up and died of starvation before the day was over.

Logan Marshall sat down in the seat opposite him. He gave Dick a curt nod that the other boy did not return, then turned to stare moodily out the window. Over the next few minutes, Dick felt nothing but bubbling resentment toward the whole world in particular. Then the anger gave way to loneliness. He wished he had someone to talk to.

"Excuse me," said a quiet voice. Dick looked up. A girl with a

blonde ponytail and large blue eyes was standing rather shyly in the bus aisle. "Could you scoot over? I have to sit here, too."

"Oh, my bad." Dick sat up straight and scooted over, allowing Ashley Thompson to plop down beside him.

"I'm Ashley," she said, holding out a hand.

"Dick," he replied, shaking it. Ashley's eyes went wide.

"Excuse me?" she asked.

"No," Dick added quickly, thinking she had taken it as an insult. "That's my name. I'm Dick Grayson."

"Oh, right." Ashley pulled her hand away, studying him intently. "You look very familiar."

"I could say the same about you," he said. Ashley cocked her head to one side. Dick recognized the motion as something he did every day. Neither said anything for a little while. The bus pulled out of the school parking lot and began the long drive home. Dick's stomach suddenly let out another loud growl, breaking the silence.

"Let me guess," said Ashley with a mischievous grin. "You planned on buying lunch, but then didn't eat it because the cafeteria food is still alive."

"Yep." His stomach growled again; suddenly it was very talkative. "Didn't you?"

"Nope!" she said cheerfully. "I had the sense and experience to know that cafeteria food isn't edible, so I brought my lunch." Ashley thought for a moment. "You know, the lunch period is so short, I didn't get to finish mine. I've still got some brownies that my mother baked for me. Want one?"

"Please and thank you," Dick grinned gratefully. He accepted the brownie and bit into it. Chocolate never tasted so good. "My compliments to the chef."

"Yeah," Ashley smiled. "My mom makes the best brownies in the world. Then again, I guess all of us think our mothers are the best cooks, right?" Dick swallowed and looked out the window.

"My mom doesn't cook much," he said quietly. It was true enough; after all, how could Mary Grayson cook if she was dead?

"Takeout kind of person, huh?" Ashley prattled on. "That's cool too. At least your mom doesn't go through the experimental stuff. One time, she and my dad had this crazy idea about starting a pizza business, and they kept trying new recipes. It got so bad that I could hardly look at a pizza for a month."

"How can you begin to dislike pizza?" Dick inquired incredulously—he and the others practically lived off it.

"By eating it for lunch and dinner for three weeks solid." Dick stopped himself from replying that he did that every so often anyway. Ashley wasn't paying attention. She had turned around in her seat and was talking to Logan.

"You need to get over here, Logan," she said. "I can't talk to you over there."

"I can't, Ash," Logan replied. His voice was actually quite friendly. "The bus driver looks like she'd fling me out the emergency exit if I moved."

"Nah," Ashley grinned. "She'll stop caring after the first few days. This is just to keep the troublemakers away from each other. Next week, we'll be able to sit wherever we want."

"That's a relief," Dick sighed. He'd be able to rescue his friends from their horrible bus mates, and they could all sit together. Suddenly he remembered something. "Why didn't you ride the bus this morning, Ashley?"

The blonde flicked her long ponytail off of her shoulder.

"Like I said earlier, I ran into trouble on the way to school."

"What kind of trouble?"

"None of your business," Logan snapped. Dick was taken aback, and Ashley scowled.

"Aw, Lo, leave him alone." Logan pulled a face at her and turned back out the window. "Don't mind him. He can be a bit of a butt hole sometimes." Logan snorted, but Dick couldn't help but smile. He still wasn't sure if he and Logan would get along any time soon, but he liked Ashley. Yet there was something bizarrely familiar about her, and he just couldn't put his finger on it.

They talked all during the bus trip. As it turned out, Ashley got on at Dick's stop, and they were the last stop of the day. Dick told Ashley about his friends and Ashley told Dick about Logan and her home life and her sports interests. By the time it was time to get off the bus, Dick was feeling considerably more cheerful. Maybe this school year wouldn't be so bad after all.

"It was cool talking to you," Dick told her as they got off.

"You too," she smiled. But there was still that look in her eyes, as though she recognized him from somewhere. Dick could see it lurking in their dark blue depths.

"Hey," Ashley said suddenly. "Where do you live?"

Suddenly, an alarm went off, and the communicator in Dick's pocket began to vibrate.

_Crap! _Dick thought to himself, cringing. _I thought I put that thing on vibrate. _Dick expected Ashley to look at him in a puzzled way, but instead she looked at the watch on her wrist. The alarm was coming from it.

"Dammit," she swore. "I've got to go; I'm late for something."

"Come _on,_ Ashley!" Logan yelled from across the street. "We've got to go!"

"I need to go too. See you tomorrow," Dick said hurriedly.

"Bye." Ashley took off, and she and Logan ran together to the end of the street. Dick, however, ran in the opposite direction, following his four friends. Together they ducked into a dark, deserted alley.

"Oh, so the alarm goes off _after_ school ends!" Gar complained.

"Shut up a second." Dick flipped open his communicator and studied the screen. Slowly a smile crept over his face—the first real smile he'd given since the disastrous History incident.

"Who've we got?" asked Victor, removing his ring and becoming Cyborg once more. Kori and Gar did the same. It was very odd to see Starfire and Beastboy in anything other than their uniforms.

"Overload just decided to attack the bank."

"The bank—why is it always the bank? It's either that or the state prison," grouched Beastboy.

"You know what this means…." said Raven, pulling a dark blue cloak from her backpack. Dick grinned, and reached into his backpack for his mask, which he had had the good sense to bring along.

"Yep," he said, putting it on. "Titans, go!"


	8. Phantom and Livewire

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans (or Danny Phantom), obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Thanks so much to my reviewers—I really think you guys are going to like this chapter. Shoutouts to **AyamiLee **(sorry about your math teacher), **FireDitto **(this Raven thing is STILL giving me trouble!), **gero**, **acosta perez jose ramiro**, and **TTforlife**. You guys ROCK. I really hope you enjoy this!

Finally, what you've all been waiting for! ACTUAL ACTION! What the heck are you waiting for?

Chapter 8:

New heroes in town

Overload was having a party. The guards had not put up much of a resistance—they never did. After a few well-aimed shots from his supercharged electric arms, most of the guards lay unconscious, their weapons short-circuited; others had flown the coop in terror. Overload chuckled, a sound very much like static electricity crackling. The bank was his for the taking.

In all honesty, he didn't really know _why_ he was doing this. As a ten-foot-tall supervillain made purely of electricity, there just didn't seem like much he could do with money. If Overload wanted something, he stole it. Perhaps it was because the citizens of Jump City relied so much on money that he did it. Overload liked to watch people suffer.

The vault was just a short few yards away. Overload stepped toward it and reached out, his electric arms glowing. He planned to rip it off its hinges, simply because it was more fun than using his powers to push open the lock. Unfortunately for him, someone else had other plans.

A searing bolt of lightning-like substance slammed into his back. Overload let out a roar of pain and released the vault door, swinging around to face his enemies. He really didn't have to think about who it was—after all, the Teen Titans were practically legendary in Jump City. But as Overload scanned the room, he was extremely surprised by what he saw.

There were only two people in the room. One was a boy, the other a girl. Both were masked, and both were clad in black, although the girl's uniform had a lightning bolt splashed across it, stretching from her shoulder to her hip. Her masked eyes were glowing yellow, and a glow surrounded her hands.

"I don't know who you are," she said.

"But you might want to leave now," finished the boy, his clear voice ringing in the bank's interior. He was obviously a leader of some sort.

Overload snarled angrily. He didn't know who these little kids were, but they were certainly not the Teen Titans. Overload's small brain refused to believe that anyone besides the Titans could take him down. He was not afraid of these new individuals.

Big mistake.

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The Teen Titans wove their way quickly toward the city bank. Robin and Cyborg ran on the street, while the girls flew. Beastboy morphed into a cheetah and raced along by their sides. After a long day at school, they were ready to stretch their legs, have some fun, and kick some bad-guy butt. Much to their surprise, when they arrived at the bank, the police cars were already there. Officers hid behind their doors, guns pointing at entrance.

"What's going on?" Robin asked, panting slightly from the run. The officer he was addressing jumped and looked around.

"Huh? How're you out here?"

"Uh, dude, what are you talking about?" asked Cyborg. The officer shook his head.

"Everyone thought you Titans were in there beating up Overload for the past five minutes."

"That's impossible," snapped Raven, her eyes flashing. "We just got here."

"Well, _someone_ is in there, and it sounds like they're giving Overload a run for his money." The officer pointed to the doors of the bank. Suddenly they flew open and what looked like the door to the vault catapulted out of them. It hurtled through the air straight toward the policemen, but Raven put up a shield of magic, and the heavy vault door glanced off harmlessly.

"Whoa!" said Beastboy, his eyes wide. "Dude, he is _mad_ now! We'd better get in there and see if we can help." Robin nodded and motioned with his team to follow him. Together the five Titans ran to the doors and ducked inside.

The lobby was in ruins, and it seemed that the fight had moved out there. Overload was roaring furiously at the ceiling. Looking up, the Titans saw a black shadow flitting along the lights, going so fast it looked like a blur. It paused for a brief moment, and the team got a good look of who had decided to crash their mission.

A girl hovered near the ceiling. She was dressed in a black uniform, with a yellow lightning bolt emblem stretching from her right shoulder to her left hip. Her eyes were masked, though it wasn't the full mask like Robin's. It was merely a black rim around her eyes—the irises beneath shone a bright electric blue. Taking careful aim, the girl pulled back her arm and unleashed a ball of pure electricity at Overload. The monster sparked violently, bellowing in pain, and he took a swipe at her. The girl dived under his arms and shot off toward the opposite wall.

"Look at her go!" cheered Beastboy. "Come on, let's go help."

"Hang on," said Robin, holding out a hand. "I want to watch this."

The girl zigzagged through the air, dodging the blows Overload was throwing at her. "Anytime now, Phantom!" she yelled agitatedly as one of the monster's shots barely grazed her side.

"I'm on it!" a different voice called back. The Titans looked around, puzzled, but could see no one. Suddenly Overload's head snapped up, as though he had been kicked under the chin, and he let loose a bellow of rage.

"Overload will crush you!" he vowed, swinging at his invisible opponent.

"What's the matter?" the disembodied voice taunted—Overload took a swing at the source, but caught only air. "Can't catch what you can't see?" The invisible person dealt Overload a blow that sent him flat on his back. Overload was back on his feet in an instant. The girl in the air was cheering, "Alright, go Phantom!"

The invisible attacker came back for another round, but this time Overload was ready. As soon as he felt contact, the monster allowed the electricity to flow through his body, delivering a powerful voltage into the body of his assailant. A cry of pain rent the air, and a moment later a boy flickered into view, his wiry frame thrashing in agony. Overload's attack ceased, and the boy fell limply to the floor, his body smoking slightly.

"Phantom!" the girl from the ceiling screamed. She dived toward her fallen companion, but Overload swung out his arm. The blow caught her in the stomach, and with a gasp she was flung against the wall and sank to the floor.

Starfire gasped. "I wish to help now, please!"

"Titans, go!" Robin shouted, drawing his Bo staff. The five heroes charged, and Overload looked up, finally noticing that the Titans had arrived. He was beyond ticked off now. With a roar of fury, he grabbed a teller's desk and threw it at them with all his might. Starfire used a starbolt to blast it out of the air, and it exploded into a thousand pieces.

Beastboy bolted to Overload's other side, racing along in the form of a cheetah. Cyborg joined him, firing at Overload with his plasma cannon.

"It's not even fazing him!" he shouted, ducking as Overload aimed a blow at his head.

"Beastboy Blitz! Now!" Beastboy morphed into an armadillo, and Cyborg picked him up and threw the changeling as hard as he could over Overload's head. As soon as Beastboy had hit the peak of his ascent, he transformed into a T-rex, and fell onto Overload with a heavy thud that shook rubble from the ceiling. The monster screamed with rage and let the power surge through him. Beastboy was thrown to the opposite wall with the force of the blast, his hair standing on end.

"Okay, Overload," snarled Raven, taking her place in the fight. "I think it's time we put your lights out. Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" Summoning the power from within her, Raven reached out with her magic and seized a chair that had been blasted into the wall. Raven pulled back her hands as if she were about to throw something, and then pushed forward. The chair caught Overload directly in the head. Starfire sailed in, carrying Robin by the arms. She let go, and Robin gave Overload a kick in the face he wouldn't soon forget. Unfortunately, Overload caught Starfire in mid-air, and the force of his punch threw her across the wall, where she sank next to the girl. But Starfire was up quickly.

"Friend," she said to the girl beside her, who was very much awake and watching the fight wide-eyed. "Why are you not up and fighting?"

"You're—you're the—" the girl gasped, her blue eyes wide. "The _Teen Titans_," she finally managed to choke out.

"Yes," said Starfire, unable to understand exactly why this was such a big deal to the girl. "I am Starfire. May I inquire as to what your name is?"

"Livewire," the girl replied, offering a hand. Starfire shook it; an electric tingle ran up her arm. "Hey, did you see where my friend went?" she asked suddenly.

"The Phantom? He is still over there, is he not?" Starfire looked; the prone form of the boy had disappeared.

"No," said a voice. "I'm right here." The black-clad boy stepped out of thin air. His mask had the whites that covered his eyes, much like Robin's mask.

"Hey!" yelled a different voice. All three of them turned; Cyborg was fending off an attack from Overload with a steel beam. "I hate to break up your little introduction, Star, but we could really use some help!"

The three heroes jumped into action. The girls shot into the air, and Phantom disappeared.

Robin wasn't having much luck with his approach. He continually attacked Overload with his staff and threw a few Birdarangs, but the monster had worked himself into such a frenzy Robin doubted he even felt it. Robin deftly dodged airborne objects and blows from Overload, but finally he slipped up. As he thrust out with his staff, Overload grabbed it and sent a shock through it. The voltage raced through Robin's body, and he fell back with a shout. Overload laughed, more out of hysteria than humor, and raised the staff above his head, planning to bring it down heavily upon its owner.

"Overload shall destroy!" he shouted, still laughing, and not seeing Livewire fly up behind him.

"Overload, huh?" she taunted, grabbing hold of the end of the metal staff. "Well, electro-butt, let's see how you handle a power surge!" With a furious yell, Livewire summoned all the power she had within her and drew it from the circuits of the building. The lights dimmed as she drained the power from the wires. For a moment, Livewire withheld the blast, allowing it to build up within her. Then she released it, channeling the power surge through her hands and into the staff—and directly into Overload.

A scream like none that the Titans had ever heard ripped through the air, and the electric-blue light Overload gave off flared to a brightness that blinded them. With a sound very much like an explosion, Overload short-circuited, and he collapsed into the rubble.

Livewire floated down to the floor and sank to her knees, gasping. She was completely wiped out. Phantom stepped out of the air and put a hand on her shoulder.

"You okay?" he asked anxiously. Still gasping for breath, Livewire nodded. She then looked up and pointed to Robin, Starfire, Raven, Cyborg and Beastboy, who had clustered together and were staring at the newcomers with as much curiosity as Phantom and Livewire were at them.

"Phantom," she panted. "Those are the Teen Titans." The eye slits on Phantom's mask went wide.

"Wow," said Robin, leading his team over to them. "You guys are fantastic. Who are you?"

"Let's just say we're new in town," said Phantom cautiously. "I'm Phantom. This is Livewire."

"So we heard," commented Raven dryly. Phantom glared for a moment, but his face gradually grew interested.

"I _think_ I can tell exactly who each of you are," he said thoughtfully. "You've got to be Robin." He pointed to the Titan's leader. "That's Cyborg, Starfire, Raven, and Beastboy."

Beastboy blinked. "Uh, yeah, that's us. How'd you know that? We haven't seen you around before."

"Oh, we're from the other side of the state," said Livewire, getting to her feet. "You won't have heard of our group, but we sure as heck have heard of you."

"Really?" asked Cyborg. "Wow, that's kinda flattering. So… you belong to a superhero group, too?"

"Yeah, sort of… We got split up, so now there are two." Phantom shrugged, looking uncomfortable.

"Split up?" asked Robin. "What do you mean?"

"That's a question I don't want to answer," Phantom replied shortly.

"It is most fascinating to meet other people with talents such as ours," smiled Starfire. She hovered over to Livewire, who took a step back, a little startled. "You are not from another planet, are you? Your powers are very much like mine."

"No, I'm an Earthling and all that. My power comes from electricity. I can draw it from the circuits in a building and pull it from waves in the air." Livewire grinned mischievously, and held up one hand. After a moment, the lights dimmed, and her hand was surrounded by a crackling yellow aura. Her blond ponytail began to frizz. She released the energy, and a bolt of electricity shot into the opposite wall. "The only problem with it is the electricity makes your hair all static-y." She grouchily began to smooth out her ponytail.

"What sort of power do you have? Besides turning invisible." Robin directed the question at Phantom.

"I can phase through stuff," he shrugged. The others looked at him blankly. With a sigh, Phantom's face adopted a look of concentration. Suddenly, they could see right through him. It seemed as though he were vibrating very fast. "See?" he inquired, privately enjoying the Titans' dumbfounded reactions. "Solid stuff just goes right through me."

Overcome with curiosity, Robin extended a hand. For a moment he hesitated, unsure if this was okay, but then he passed his hand through Phantom's head, through the mask and the curly brown hair. It was like sticking his hand into a bucket of ice. Both boys shivered, and Phantom solidified his forearm and caught Robin's wrist before the Titan could do it again.

"Don't," he said hardly. "Just because I can go through stuff doesn't mean it's an enjoyable experience."

"Sorry," Robin flushed, and dropped his hand to his side.

"Phantom?" asked Beastboy curiously. "Like Danny Phantom, because of your powers?" The statement was met by silence.

"Nnnnnoooooo, not after Danny Phantom," the boy replied, arching an eyebrow. "Who is that, anyway?" Beastboy nearly fell over.

"You've _never _heard of Danny Phantom?"

"No."

"Honestly, Beastboy, I haven't either," shrugged Robin.

"What is the _matter_ with you people?" cut in Livewire. "Don't you watch TV? Cripes, even _I've _heard of Danny Phantom." Beastboy grinned at her for her support.

Overload groaned on the floor, making everyone jump.

"Do you…face things like that a lot?" asked Livewire nervously.

"Yeah, actually. Overload is really a pushover." Robin shrugged. "If we turn on the sprinklers, he's pretty much done."

"_That_ would have been really helpful to know," Phantom growled testily. "I could have activated the sprinklers instead of getting fried."

"You know, you _could've _phased through the charge. You just _didn't_," Livewire chided.

"Need I remind you that electricity is not a solid object?" Phantom snapped. "I can go through it, sure, but I'd rather get caught in the stomach with one of your lightning bolts than phase through it and have it cook my insides." More than one Titan winced at that.

A head poked through the door of the bank.

"Is the fight over?" the policeman asked hesitantly. Then he caught sight of Phantom and Livewire. "Hey, who're they?"

Both Phantom and Livewire went white.

"Uh-oh," said Phantom, grabbing Livewire's wrist. "We've got to go. I'm sure we'll see you guys again."

"Hey, wait!" cried Beastboy. "What's your hurry?" Neither teen replied as Livewire rose into the air and flew towards the ceiling. For a moment it seemed as though she were going to try to blast her way through the roof—but suddenly the two figures shimmered and phased through, flying off into the dusk.

"Whoa!" the policeman gasped. A few reporters and other officers began to creep in, hunched over as if they were afraid of being caught and thrown across the wall. "Who were they?"

"Phantom and Livewire," Robin murmured, more to himself than anyone else. The news crews lost all tentativeness and jumped into action, determined to be the first to report the story of two new superheroes in Jump City. The authorities began the task of tying up Overload and calling in a prison truck for his transport, but none of the Titans seemed too interested. They all continued to stare, transfixed, at the spot on the ceiling where the two mysterious strangers had disappeared.


	9. The Plot Thickens

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Chapter 9:

The Plot Thickens

The story of Phantom and Livewire was all over the news networks that night. The Titans, free of homework, piled on the couch to watch.

"The top story tonight is of the appearance of two new superheroes in Jump City," Stacey Fields reported from channel twelve. "At approximately four-fifteen this afternoon, Overload, the electrical monster, broke into the city bank and began to wreak havoc. Minutes after he broke in, the police arrived, only to see that the fight was already underway. Believing the cause of the raucous to be the local superhero group, the Teen Titans, the police force waited outside the doors. Moments later, however, it was discovered that the source of the chaos was not our heroes, but two new vigilantes giving Overload quite a workout. The Titans rushed in, and with the help of the new heroes, they managed to disable Overload—"

"_They_ helped _us?"_ repeated Cyborg incredulously. "Who were getting their butts kicked when we came in, huh?"

"Shhh," snapped Robin. "I want to listen."

"And showing the villain, quite literally, that crime doesn't pay," Stacey continued. "Unfortunately, the two new vigilantes fled before our news crew had the chance to interview them." A clip of Livewire and Phantom appearing through the roof and shooting off into the distance played briefly on the screen. "As far as our sources can gather, the names of the two new heroes are Phantom, the boy, and Livewire, the girl. Apparently, they are from a small, discreet organization of six superpowered teens from the other side of the state…"

"That must be what they were talking about," said Raven, folding her arms. The Titans watched as short clips played of the six kids, showing brief images of Phantom and Livewire fighting alongside a very short boy with thick glasses, another masked youth that looked bizarrely like Robin, a girl with telekinetic powers, dressed in lavender gym clothes and a headband that rested on her forehead, and another masked girl in black with a red X on her chest. The villains the clips featured looked every bit as weird as the crooks the Titans fought, including a boy with wings sprouting from his back and something that looked like a woman from the torso up and had the thick body of an emerald-green serpent from the waist down.

"This thing says that no news network has been able to contact these guys," said Cyborg thoughtfully. "I wonder why they want to stay hidden so badly. You know, Robin, if you did your hair differently you'd look exactly like that—Hotshot kid. At least, I think that's what they said his name was."

Starfire nodded. "Phantom, Livewire, Gadget, Hotshot, Mindwave, and X-Ray. That is what the Stacey Fields said they are called."

"Hang on a sec," said Robin suddenly, sitting up straight and looking attentively at the screen.

"…and although attempts were made, this reporter was unable to retrieve any of the footage from the security cameras in the bank. The tapes were stolen from the surveillance room."

"Well, that's weird," said Robin, turning off the television. "Why would someone steal the tapes of the fight?"

"I dunno," shrugged Cyborg. "Maybe Phantom snitched them from the surveillance room before they left."

"But we saw them leave," argued Starfire. "They would not have had time to take the tapes."

"Well, then, maybe Phantom snuck back in, invisible, and stole them. I don't know!" Cyborg snapped. "All I'm saying is that he didn't seem to want the cops to know about them."

"Maybe…." Robin frowned, staring out the window across the bay. The last fingers of light had trailed away, allowing the darkness to veil the city and the dark water of the bay. The bridge was hardly a smudge in the night. "But I'm not so sure it was them."

"You want to know something I'm sure about?" piped Beastboy.

"No," Raven replied dryly, "but I'm sure you're going to tell us anyway."

"That Livewire girl looks _good_ in spandex."

The rest of the evening was given up—at least for Robin and Cyborg—to tease Beastboy mercilessly.

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A masked man sat in front of a huge screen, watching with interest, his chin resting on top of his interlaced fingers. A figure watched over his shoulder, waiting anxiously for the masked man's reaction.

"Most…interesting," the man said finally. His voice was slick like oil, but colder than the Arctic ice, and with a hard, cruel edge to it. His tone was deathly calm—he rarely ever spoke differently. He rewound the tape and watched the scenes again—Livewire nailing Overload with a lightning bolt, and Phantom going through his invisible duel with the monster. "They are certainly powerful, but it will take more to convince me of your proposition."

"Keep watching, the girl especially," said the figure behind him. The masked man watched as the Titans leapt into the fight to help, and how the girl Livewire drained the power from the circuitry in the building and used Robin's staff as a lightning rod, short-circuiting Overload on her own.

"Impressive," the man murmured.

"Yes. This is not one of the boy's better fights; normally he is much more fierce. He can phase through solid objects as well—and I have already told you about the powers of the others."

"Yes. A supergenius, a genetically enhanced human, a telepath, and one with the power of x-ray vision. Most useful in combat," the man replied. He spun in his chair to face his companion, his fingers still interlaced. "But tell me again—what will I gain by helping you, exactly?"

The smaller man fidgeted nervously, scratching his enormous head. "The six children I have shown you are—failed experiments. And as every scientist knows, a failed experiment must be detained for observation…or destroyed." He scowled. "These… Super Six, as they call themselves, have been a thorn in my side since day one. I wish to capture them, find out what I did that still allows them to resist me, and dispose of them permanently. You wish to destroy the Teen Titans. If you help me to capture _my _enemies, I can help you capture yours. In return, I will allow you to keep one of the Six… as an apprentice, if you will."

"I haven't much use for apprentices anymore," the man replied flatly, glaring at the other through a cold eye. "The one most desirable refuses the offer, and the other is frozen in a comatose state inside obsidian volcanic rock. The destruction of the Titans is all that I wish." The man let his hands fall into his lap and rest on his knees. "Your offer is quite…. interesting. I believe we may have reached a deal. Of course," he continued, his voice hard, "that all depends on what you wish in return for your services."

"Half of the city to control," his companion replied immediately.

"I will give you a fourth," the other replied. "In addition, you may take all the adolescents from your sector as you wish to use as guinea pigs for your experiments."

"Deal," the large-headed one answered automatically, thinking that if he could get enough genetically enhanced teenagers he could up and overthrow the other anyway.

"Good. This will, however, take time," said the masked one, turning back to the computer screen. "I wish to find their strengths and weaknesses as a group."

"Spray the girl with water and she'll electrocute herself. Put Phantom in a box with walls over two feet thick and he will be unable to escape," the other shrugged. "The others have similar weaknesses."

"Not those kinds of weaknesses. I do not wish to take them from the outside. I want to know their weaknesses on the inside." The masked man used the computer to pause the video and zoomed in on Robin's face. "This one, for example. His greatest weakness is his devotion to his friends." He allowed the clip to play and froze it on Raven. "With her, it is her emotions that are her downfall. You see, my friend, as teenagers, their bodies are far more easily broken than their spirits—but once you have breached their defenses, they are little more than puppets, forced to do whatever you wish." Slade turned back around to face Professor Grimm. "And if I am correct, all eleven of them will make a fine little collection of marionettes indeed."


	10. Day Two

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

I'm really glad you guys liked the last two chapters! I had fun writing them. Special thanks to my reviewers: **TTforlife**, **AyamiLee**, **elecktrum **(the amazing E!), **gero**, and **acosta perez jose ramiro**. Here's this week's installment!

Chapter 10:

Day Two

"No, no!" groaned Beastboy, grabbing the doorframe in an effort not to be hauled out of his room. "I don't want to go!"

"Quit it, Beastboy!" snapped Robin, giving the changeling's ankles a rough yank. "If you don't hurry up, we're going to be late!"

"You say that like it's a bad thing," said Beastboy, letting down his defenses for a moment. Another ferocious pull from Robin sent both boys sprawling into the wall, a mass of tangled limbs.

"Get _off_, you're crushing my lungs!" growled Robin, shoving Beastboy off of him. "I don't really want to go to school today, either, but it doesn't look like we have much of a choice, do we?"

Raven's voice rang out from the kitchen.

"Will you two hurry up?" she snapped. "We've been waiting down here for fifteen minutes at least."

"Coming!" Robin hollered back. He reached back to run his fingers through his hair, but then remembering that he wasn't supposed to have spikes he tried to flatten it again. "Get a move on, Gar, I don't want to walk to school."

"Fine," Beastboy grouched, slumping into his room to get ready.

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The bus ride to school was pretty miserable for the others, but Dick didn't have half as bad a time as he had yesterday. Ashley and Logan were good conversation buddies, although it was really Ashley that did the most talking. Girls seemed to rely on talking as much as oxygen or food. Logan wasn't much of a chatter and stayed rather distant, but Dick conversed openly with his new friend, all the while trying to force back the irritating feeling that he had seen her somewhere before.

During first period, Mrs. Underwood immediately set them to work. They took notes on the lesson and watched as Mrs. Underwood worked out example problems on the board, mostly covering things they had all learned the grade before. Gar, who had been part of the Titans during eighth grade, took careful notes but was still pretty lost. He alone out of the whole class had homework that night because he'd been unable to finish it in class.

Second period was a bit more eventful for everyone—Joey and Gar talked to each other all during Tatum's class, ignoring his furious glares. Kori continued to defy all Mrs. Burton's attempts to prove that her students were bumbling nitwits. Thirteen people in Advanced Language Arts spent about five solid minutes on the floor laughing their heads off; one of the twins, to his own utter embarrassment, had screwed up while reading a line, and instead of saying "See how well my garments sit upon me" said "See how well my grandparents sit upon me." Dick and Victor were still snickering about it when they left for third period, but Raven had gotten over her giggling fit quite quickly (especially after she accidentally made the light bulb in the hallway explode).

Spanish actually wasn't that bad. Gar and Dick found out that Senora Rodriguez was fast-talking and strict, but not nearly as bad as Mrs. Burton or Mr. Tatum. They got into the basic introductory stuff before heading off to lunch. Joey sat with them, a constant source of burning energy that spent more time talking than eating. The Titans marveled at the fact that he _was_ eating, and with much gusto.

"How can you do that without barfing?" Dick asked wonderingly as he watched Joey shovel what might have been meatloaf into his mouth, eating so fast it was as though the redhead thought it might disappear.

"Are you kidding? This stuff is loads better than some of the stuff I get at home," Joey said through a mouthful.

"Why? Doesn't your mom cook?" inquired Victor.

"Don't have a mom." That ended the conversation right there—the Titans because they felt guilty for dragging up such a delicate topic, Joey because he was too busy eating.

The electives could have gone better, but they could have gone worse too. Raven and Ashley got to know each other a little bit, as did Logan and Kori. Gym, however, was a different story.

Because they realized all of them had the same class together, Dick, Kori, Victor, Raven, Gar, Ashley, Logan, and the ever-present Joey all walked together after running the required two laps. Ashley and Logan were debating over whether soccer or basketball was the better sport, and Victor made it worse by saying that football was the best. So Dick, Kori, Raven, and Joey watched, quite amused, as the other four argued, because Gar had jumped to Ashley's defense and was proving quite pathetically that he knew nothing whatsoever of the sport.

"Have you ever even played soccer?" she asked, exasperated. Gar cut himself off in mid-sentence and blushed, looking down. "Oh brother," Ashley groaned, rolling her eyes to the sky. Shamefaced, Gar hung back a little as the others walked on. Noticing his friend's absence, Dick hung back as well and allowed Gar to catch up to him. Victor joined them shortly.

"You're trying too hard," Dick told him. Gar looked up, startled.

"What d'you mean?" he asked, confused.

"It's totally obvious that you like her, man." Dick smirked as Gar's face went from puzzled to horrified. "Quit trying to impress her. Just relax and be yourself, and she'll probably get to liking you too."

"So how come you know all about girls all the sudden?" asked Vic, fighting back a grin.

"Because," Dick replied in a sagely voice, "contrary to popular belief, I actually _am_ a boy, and I _do _take interest in the opposite sex. Sometimes it's pretty easy to tell what a girl is thinking, and right now Ashley is uncomfortable with you trying to be more than a friend."

"So if you can tell what a girl is thinking, how come you still haven't picked up on it when Kori hits on you?" Vic let his smile out this time.

"What are you talking about?" Dick asked, looking up at his friend. His blue eyes were totally clueless, and both Vic and Gar had to laugh.

"Okay," said Gar. "I'll lay off for a while. I still can't put my finger on it, though. _Where the heck have we seen her before?"_

"I don't know," Dick shrugged. "But it's been driving me crazy as well." Seeing that the others had drawn very far ahead, the three boys raced after them.

They walked around the football field, talking about school and other things normal teenagers are supposed to talk about, until…Shouts of laughter rang out across the football field. Curious, the Titans and their new friends stopped to see what was going on. A group of kids had gathered around a small, runty looking boy, laughing derisively as he tried to escape the circle.

"Hey, dork!" shouted a kid with a leather jacket and spiked hair. "Wanna play dodge ball?" He hurled the ball he was holding at the boy. The ball caught him full in the stomach, and he hit the ground, winded.

"Hey loser," taunted one of the others, a stocky kid who looked very much like the first. "What part of _dodge _ball didn't you get? You're supposed to try to dodge it. Don't make this too easy for us." The small boy tried to get up and leave the circle, but every time he got close to the edge, one of the boys would push him across to one of his companions.

"What unpleasant people," said Kori, glaring in their direction. Although the hologram projector covered it up mostly, a faint green glow could be seen coming from her eyes.

"That first kid—the one with the spikes—that's Bradley," said Joey, shifting from one foot to the other. "He's in our History class. He was in my school last year, too. Bradley's a bully; I used to get beat up by him a lot."

"Bastard," Dick muttered. Raven looked at him, surprised at the venom in his voice. She glanced down at his hands; they were clenching and unclenching, and the legs beneath his baggy gym shorts were tensed and ready to run.

"Don't," she said quietly. Dick jumped a little and looked at her.

"Don't what?" he asked, feigning innocence.

"Attack him. I know you want to, but we have to keep a low profile so we aren't discovered. All you have to do is give him a good roundhouse kick and people will start asking questions."

"I know…." Dick grimaced, agitated. "It just doesn't feel right. We're the good guys, we're supposed to help people like that, not ignore them---"

"Don't worry about it, man," Victor assured him, coming over and listening to their quiet conversation. "Kids like that are always getting picked on. It's going to happen whether we step in or not."

"That doesn't make it right," Dick growled, reluctantly turning his back on the scene. The jeering laughs from the group of boys chased him all the way down the field.

The other three were just as indignant about it.

"How can the teachers not see that?" Logan ranted. "I mean, they're loud enough for the whole freakin' school to hear, so why doesn't someone step in?"

"I swear, one of these days I'm going to---" Ashley broke herself off there, compensating by making a few violent gestures, miming exactly what she would do to the bullies if she got her hands on them. She was getting really worked up. A few small strands of her ponytail began to drift around freely. Logan lightly touched her arm, saying softly, "Ash, you're frizzing."

"Oh!" She reached around and smoothed out her ponytail.

"Does that happen often?" Dick asked, walking beside her.

"What, my hair? Actually, yeah." Ashley shrugged. "It'll do that when I get really upset. I don't have any idea why." She didn't look at him as she said it.

The two of them walked on together, a little ahead of the others, until someone called, "Hey, you two! Wait up!" Ashley and Dick looked back at the exact same time. The others hurried to catch up, but both Logan and Victor stopped short; poor Logan was nearly bowled over by the much bigger Victor.

"_Dude_," breathed Logan.

"What?" asked Dick, suddenly realizing that everyone was looking at him and Ashley.

"You two," said Victor in amazement. "I didn't notice it before, but it's really obvious when you stand side by side. Your eyes… they're exactly the same…"  
Dick looked at Ashley, and Ashley looked at Dick. It was true, and neither of them had noticed either. The eyes were perfect reflections of one another—the same sharp, ice blue color, with darker blue and silvery flecks around the pupils. The only difference was the personalities that gleamed from within them.

"Well, that's kind of weird," murmured Dick.

"Kinda?" asked Ashley, cocking an eyebrow. "Try _very_."

"It's probably just a coincidence," said Raven. "Come on, the bell's going to ring any second now." They trudged up the hill and into the locker rooms.

After changing out, the Titans met up before breaking off to their separate classes.

"Man, that was freaky," shivered Victor. "I looked at you two and for a split second couldn't tell which was which. Which is weird, considering after the eyes, you two look nothing alike."

"It was most disturbing," frowned Kori. "But we should probably think nothing of it. As Raven has said, it is most likely a coincidence. A matter of no importance."

"Maybe…." Gar watched the door to the girl's locker room, and a few moments later Ashley came out, her gym bag slung over her shoulder. She set it down and pulled out a hairbrush. A girl came over to her and they began to talk, smiling and laughing the way girls do. Gar felt a flush when he realized he was staring. But suddenly he couldn't look away, because just then Ashley pulled the hair band out of her blonde tresses and let them fall loose. Some of her locks fell over one eye, concealing it, but she shook it back as she chattered with her friend. Gar suddenly realized why she looked so familiar.

"Dudes…" He nudged Dick, who was standing next to him, and the others looked up. He jerked his head in Ashley's direction. "Who does she look like?"

They looked. Kori gasped.

"Terra…"

"That's insane…" It was true. Big blue eyes; blond hair; long, thin body built for running. It would have been hard to tell Terra and Ashley apart.

Ashley suddenly looked up, realizing she was being watched. She cocked an eyebrow when she saw the others staring. Everyone looked away immediately, feeling stupid for being caught.

"You don't think Ashley is, like, Terra's sister or something?" Dick asked in a hushed voice. Gar shook his head.

"Terra was an only. She told me so herself." He looked back at Ashley, who had turned her attention to her bag. "No wonder I thought she was pretty…."

"Well, if she does have any ties to Terra, we should be careful," Raven said darkly. "She might want revenge on the Titans, blaming us for what happened…"

"But hardly anyone knows what happened," Kori disagreed. "How would Ashley have found out?"

"I'm not sure," said Dick, his brow furrowed. Everyone looked at him; Dick was glaring at the floor, deep in concentration. "There's something else, though, I've seen her somewhere else before…." He sighed. "Dang! I wish I could remember."

"Hey, we'd better go," said Victor suddenly. "The bell's about to ring."

"Right," said Gar. "We're going to wait for Ashley. See you guys later." The other three left for French, and Ashley joined Dick and Gar moments later.

"What were you guys staring at?" she asked. Dick and Gar exchanged glances.

"Ah, nothing. We just realized that you look a lot like someone we used to know," Dick shrugged as they walked.

"Oh, really? Who?" Ashley cocked her head to one side. That bothered Dick—it made her seem all the more familiar. Not like Terra, but someone else.

"Just a friend," said Gar quietly.

"Oh," Ashley replied, tossing her hair over her shoulder. She had jammed it back up into a silky ponytail. "You know, Dick, you look exactly like one of _my_ friends—his name is Tim, he was one of my best friends when Logan and I lived in Rachel."

"I was wondering why you two kept looking at me funny!" Dick exclaimed, relieved that they hadn't recognized him for something else.

"Wait," cut in Gar. "_Both _of you used to live in Rachel? That's on the other side of the state. Are you two, like, stepsiblings or something?"

"No." Ashley shook her head. "Our parents got jobs here for some reason. It's a lucky thing for us, but everyone was really upset when both of us left."

"Who's 'everyone'?" Dick probed.

"Our friends. We had a… club, I guess you could say. Well, not a club, it's more like you two, Victor, Kori and Raven." Her eyes suddenly got a distant look in them, and she smiled, memories playing in her mind. "We were one big group. Everyone had something different to contribute. Me, I'm quick-witted and kinda bossy. Logan was our leader—no one elected him or anything, but he seemed the best for the job. Gill was the smart one, a regular Einstein. Julia—she's my best friend in the whole world—was kind of quiet and shy, but she was _amazing_ at gymnastics. So was Tim, but he was the clown of the group. Oh, and Laura, she was quiet too, but some of the things she said would leave us on the floor laughing." Her smile broadened. "I miss them a lot, but I kind of like it here, too."

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"Okay, class," said Mr. Abbott about halfway through the period. Everyone sat up a little straighter; something big was coming. "Project time!" The students slumped in their seats with groans; this was the first class to assign a project, and on only the second day! "Don't feel discouraged, it's fairly easy and you get to work with a partner. All you have to do is pick an animal and do a small research paper on it. The rubrics are on the table, and it's due on the twenty-fourth. Go ahead and choose your partners now."

"Hey, Dick," said Ashley, turning to him. "Want to be my partner?"

"I was going to work with Gar…."

"Oh, no, work with me, please!" she pleaded. Dick didn't have the heart to decline.

"Sure," he replied. Satisfied, Ashley went to the front of the room to get a rubric for the project.

"_Dude!"_ exclaimed Gar. "You were supposed to be _my_ partner!"

"I know, I'm sorry—"

_"And _you get to work with the cute girl! That's not fair!"

"Hey, chill out!" Dick exclaimed, seeing that Gar was angry. "I'm not going to try to steal your girl. She's all yours. I just didn't want to turn her down." Gar glowered.

"Well, who the heck am I supposed to work with now?" he whined.

"I don't know. Hey, one of the twins is over there, ask him if you can work together."

"Which one is he? Cole or Colin?" asked Gar, who had both of them in Art.

"I think it's Cole, but I'm not sure."

"Ah, whatever. Hey Cole!" Gar marched through the crowd of students, trying to get to the twin. "Or Colin! Want to be my project partner?"

"Okay, I've got the rubric," said Ashley, coming back. "Gar isn't mad at me, is he?"

"No, he's mad at me."

"Whoops! Sorry." She grinned sheepishly. "Can I come over to your house sometime this week so we can get a jump on this?"

"Um…" Dick took a moment to imagine what would happen if he told Ashley he lived in a giant T. "My house isn't so good. What about yours?"

"Yeah, okay," shrugged Ashley, but Dick could see she was disappointed. _Why?_ He couldn't help but wonder.

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At approximately four-thirty that afternoon, Dick was sitting in detention, with Logan Marshall a few empty seats away. Both boys were bored out of their minds—they had no homework to do, neither had thought to bring a book, and they weren't allowed to talk. So rather than watch the clock make it's infuriatingly slow journey to five o'clock and freedom, the two of them stared longingly out the window, where the sun was bright, the birds were singing, and a crisp breeze was ruffling the grass. In all actuality, it was stiflingly hot (What did you expect? It was the middle of August), birds didn't live in the city, and the wind appeared to have gone on strike. Still, anything was better than sitting in this chilly room, where the only other people were sitting too far away to talk to without getting caught by the woman who was watching them. The silence was only broken by the sighs of the bored to tears students and the occasional scraping of feet as the kids slumped in their chairs.

Dick had resorted to counting the tiles on the floor (he'd already found out exactly how many tiles were on the ceiling) when an alarm went off. He jumped—the communicator in his pocket was vibrating against his leg. He stuck his hand into his pocket and wrapped his fingers around it protectively. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Logan sit bolt upright and look, terrified, at his watch. It was buzzing annoyingly, like an alarm clock, and the face was flashing. Logan pressed a few buttons and it shut off. The detention monitor, who had been dozing in her chair, looked up, vaguely interested.

"Sorry," said Logan. "Um, may I be excused? I…. have to go to the bathroom."

"Yeah, me too!" Dick said suddenly. He tightened his grip around the communicator. The detention monitor looked suspicious, but she let them go, and did not object when they grabbed their backpacks.

Once in the hall, the boys broke off in opposite directions, both noticing that neither was headed in the direction of the bathroom. Dick bolted into an empty classroom and closed the door, flattening himself against the wall. He pulled out his communicator and flipped open the lid.

"About time!" Cyborg snapped. "I've been on for about five minutes."

"You're telling me about problems?" Dick retorted. "I'm going to be in detention for a month when that woman finds out Logan and I aren't coming back."

"Huh? What's up with Logan?"

"Not sure, exactly, but he left with his backpack after his watch started flashing. What's the trouble?"

"See for yourself!" Cyborg held up the communicator so Dick could see the damage. Dick swore quietly—Sladebots were swarming over the downtown area, throwing cars and blowing up whatever caught their eye. Dick felt the familiar rush of hatred when he thought of Slade, and his blood began to boil.

"Okay, I'm coming," he said through gritted teeth. "Save some bad guys for me."

"Will do, but hurry up, please." Cyborg terminated the link, and Dick shoved his communicator into his pocket and ran.

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That's it for this week, guys, but I thought I'd give you a little bit of fun trivia. Most of my OC's are based off of people I've known--one of my best friends was a short redhead named Joey (although he wasn't nearly as hyperactive). I've taken most of their names from my present classmates. The whole misquoting Shakespeare incident happened to me once. I like to write what I know.

But yeah, I'm done. See you this time next week, right?


	11. Slade's Return

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

I am SO SO SO sorry about the delay in updates; the site wouldn't let me load my chapters last week. Lame, right? But I've got them here for you this week. Not two, not three--count 'em, FOUR chapters, just for you. You can't possibly be mad at me now.

Here we go again. A little action, a little foreshadowing, a little more background, because Phantom and Livewire are back! Of course. Thanks to everyone who's reading; thanks even more to those who are giving me feedback. That's the wonderful **elecktrum**, **TTforlife**, **Sunset15 **(Thanks! Jesus loves you too!), **acosta perez jose ramiro**, **robinandstarfire4ever**, and **Broken Sword of the Morning. **Read on!

Chapter 11:

Slade's Return

Robin ran over the rooftops. He preferred the roofs to the ground any day---there weren't any people to get in his way up here. Robin pressed himself for speed, stretching his legs as far as they would go in his haste to get downtown. At last, though, the gaps between the buildings became too great, and there was nothing to use his grappling hook on, so Robin took to the sidewalks. Judging by the overturned cars and still smoking scorch marks, he was getting close.

And then he saw something that made him freeze.

On the other side of the street, a shadow was moving. It was the shadow of a person, sprawled out on the wall, but the source of the shadow was nowhere to be seen. Intrigued, Robin darted over to the other side of the street as well. The shadow on the wall stopped and turned suddenly, but Robin, anticipating it, had ducked behind a car. The shadow continued onward.

Running as silently as he could, Robin snuck up right behind the shadow and jumped at the space on the sidewalk. With a yelp, someone solid hit the ground in front of Robin, and the shadow fell too. Robin pounced, pinning the invisible person to the ground, feeling his way to the figure's arms. He was about to start interrogation, when a voice yelled out.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" someone snapped. The figure Robin was sitting on flickered into view, revealing a very unhappy Phantom.

"Oh! Um… oops." Robin got off of the vigilante immediately, feeling stupid for not figuring that out.

"Oops? Is that all you have to say?" Phantom shouted, a pink tinge appearing in his pale cheeks. He turned to keep going, but after a moment's thought, Phantom turned back around and threw a punch at Robin's head. Surprised though he was, the Boy Wonder managed to duck, and the other boy's fist whistled over his shoulder.

"What was that for?" he yelled angrily.

"For attacking me," Phantom replied. "I had every right to do that. Now leave me alone, I've got work to do."

"What do you think I'm doing here? Window shopping?" Robin growled, following the other. Phantom was muttering to himself, but he began to talk furiously to Robin after realizing the other boy was walking behind him.

"You saw the shadow, didn't you?" he snapped. Without waiting for an answer, Phantom continued, "Stupid shadow. What's the point of turning invisible if you've still got a shadow? It's like a freakin' _sign_. 'Look, invisible person here.' _Jeez!" _He kicked a wall furiously.

"How come you've still got a shadow if you're invisible?" asked Robin curiously.

"When I become invisible, it's not like I'm not there anymore," he replied. "I kind of…. Oh, dang it, what was it that Gadget said?" Phantom scowled.

"Gadget?"

"Yeah, he's a super genius. He was in my old group. Anyway, he told us all exactly how our powers work. I—refract the light to make it bounce away from me. It's like a sort of shield that makes the light go around me instead of hitting me, so I turn invisible. Unfortunately, since I'm still a solid person, my shadow shows up. Stupid shadow!" He walked a little quicker. "Oh, crap."

"What?" asked Robin, but then he stood beside the other and found out exactly what.

They were on top of a hill that dropped steeply down onto Fourteenth Avenue. Or, at least, what was left of Fourteenth Avenue. The Sladebots had almost completely destroyed it. Cars were overturned and shop windows had been shattered. Sladebots were swarming over the ground—fewer than when Cyborg had called, but still a heck of a lot more than the Titans would have preferred to fight. The bots were armed, firing at the Titans. Livewire and Starfire and Raven were all in the sky, flying high above the heads of the Sladebots, firing things at them whenever they had a clear shot. Livewire zigzagged through the air, pelting the ranks below with lightning bolts from her hands. Raven managed to pick up a bus and drop it in the midst of the robots. The boys below were plowing through Sladebots three at a time, Beastboy morphing into large, carnivorous animals and Cyborg blasting with his plasma cannon.

"About time you two showed up!" Livewire snapped, swooping low over their heads to avoid a volley of blasts from the Sladebots. Robin blinked; she was yelling at both him and Phantom, as though they were already one team rather than two separate ones. "I'm angry at you, Phantom. 'Oh, don't worry, Sparky, feel free to stop any bad guys if they show up, you can handle them.' HA! I was getting my butt kicked before the others showed up!" With that she bolted back into the fray, her ponytail crackling with withheld electricity.

"Is she always like this?" Robin couldn't help but ask.

"You have no idea," groaned Phantom. "Shall we?"

"Heck yes." Robin pulled out his Bo staff, and together the two boys charged into the fight.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

"Yes, _yes_. _Very _impressive, Grimm. The boy really is quite the fighter." Slade watched, very interested, as the Titans and their new friends blasted their way through his Sladebots. The Titans and Livewire were showing their stuff—nothing new, but fascinating anyway, but Phantom was really stealing the show. He would go intangible any time a Sladebot took a punch at him, and then rebound with an attack of his own. He could fight almost as well as Robin could.

"This seems to be a waste of your robots," said Grimm, wringing his hands nervously. "Why don't we just kill them all now?"

"Patience, Grimm," Slade replied. "And be quiet. This is my favorite show."

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

"Whoa!"

Robin ducked just as a laser blast singed the air above his head, so close that it made his hair ruffle. "_That_ wasn't nice," he snarled at the Sladebot, and drove his staff into its gut. It fell to the ground, exposed circuits sparking. Robin leapt lightly over the body to help Phantom fend off a group of Sladebots that had ganged up on him.

Phantom was really more than capable of beating them back himself, but he greatly appreciated the extra help. Back to back, the boys lashed out and destroyed robot after robot, until a circle of bodies surrounded them. Still, the robots kept coming. Robin swung his staff, knocking the head of one Sladebot clean off, and Phantom landed a kick that sent one of his enemies flying ten feet away. Phantom turned and saw something Robin didn't. A few of the bots had picked up large chunk of the street, and they hurled it at the Boy Wonder as he struggled to beat back his opponents.

"Robin, look out!" he shouted, running to the boy's side. Robin turned a little too late—even if he moved, the huge boulder would hit him head on. Suddenly, he felt a hand on his shoulder, and something very strange began to happen.

His body began to tingle. It felt almost as though his whole body had fallen asleep, like he was being pricked with thousands of little pins and needles. Robin looked down and blanched—_he could see through his chest_. He glanced to his side—Phantom had his hand on Robin's shoulder and had made them both intangible. The boy's face contorted with the physical strain and suddenly the boulder hit them straight on.

Robin knew immediately why Phantom had said it wasn't an enjoyable experience. As the boulder passed directly through their bodies, everything went oddly cold. Robin could feel the boulder as it flew through—every crag and bump in the rock made itself known. When it finally passed through and Phantom removed his hand, Robin found that he was having trouble breathing and he gasped for air.

"Whoa," he gasped, panting heavily. "That was—that was amazing…. Thanks—you—you saved my life."

"Don't—mention it," Phantom panted. "See, didn't I—tell you that it wasn't a—fun experience?" Phantom stopped talking and breathed in deeply, trying to force air back into his lungs. "Dang," he gasped. "I forget how much energy it takes to do that."

"Thanks again," Robin said, straightening.

"Hey Robin!" Cyborg and the other five came running. Most of the Sladebots had been cleared out, but they had their hands on one. Cyborg and Beastboy were dragging it between them—someone had pulled its legs off. Cyborg had a grim look on his face. "Check this out," he said, and removed the face.

As always, there was a screen underneath the mask. To the Titans, this was nothing new, but the other two looked on in amazement, their eyes wide. For a moment, the screen stayed blank. But then static began to play across it and a picture flickered into view, with a very familiar figure in the center.

"Slade," said Robin coldly.

"Good to see you too, Robin," Slade replied. "A good show you and your little friends put on, I must say. Are these two new additions to the team?"

"No," cut in Phantom. Everyone glared at him to shut up.

"What do you want, Slade?" Robin snapped. An audible sigh was heard from the other end.

"One would think you had learned by now, Robin," Slade said smugly. "Every time, you ask me this, and every time I don't tell you, so what's the point in trying?" Robin flamed. "However, if you really want to know, I suppose I can humor you this once." The other six crowded in, interested. Slade held up a cylindrical object. "Do you see this, Robin?" he asked. As one, the Titans and their friends couldn't help but think _Well, duh._ "While you and your little friends were fighting my robots, I had a few others steal this out from under your nose. This is a nuclear core, Robin. It is one of the most powerful chargers in the world, and it is going to power the weapon I am building. The weapon I am going to use to destroy the city."

A ripple of shock went through the tight little group, and one or two of the girls gasped.

"You won't get away with it!" Robin snapped. "We'll stop you, like we always have."

"If I seem to recall correctly," said Slade in his oily voice, "_you _have never succeeded in stopping me. During our first major confrontation, I left my hideout rather than be defeated. And during the second, it was Terra who nearly finished me off. You five have done nothing. What makes you think you can stop me now?" This remark was met by silence.

"We will stop you," Robin said quietly. "You're not going to destroy the city while we're around."

"That might not be for as long as you think." Everyone stiffened.

"What do you mean?"

"Ah, I've said too much. I suppose you'll just have to wait and see." With that, the link terminated.

"That didn't sound good," said Cyborg.

"No kidding," Robin replied darkly. "Damn it, I was hoping that fight with Trigon had killed him." Starfire looked at him, appalled. "_What?"_ he asked incredulously, catching her look. "You can't tell me you weren't thinking the same thing!"

"Who is this guy?" asked Livewire.

"Big baddy," answered Beastboy, sidling over. "Slade's the worst of the worst. We've been fighting him for almost as long as we've been a team."

"Sounds like Professor Grimm, kind of," Phantom said to Livewire. She nodded.

"Who is the grim professor of which you speak?" asked Starfire curiously.

"He's like our Slade," said Livewire. She held up her hand, and a yellow ball of electricity formed in her palm. "He's the reason we're like this."

"What happened?" asked Robin, snapping out of his Slade-obsessive moment, suddenly interested. Phantom and Livewire exchanged looks.

"Professor Grimm lives in our old town. He's a mad scientist."

"How original," said Raven dryly.

"I know, right? Anyways, he was experimenting on genetic mutations in people that would give them unusual powers. He used kids as the guinea pigs."

"That's terrible!" gasped Starfire.

"Yeah," Phantom replied darkly. "Our friends and ourselves were exposed to this gas that only affected us because we all have a very rare blood type. It affected a couple others, but they didn't turn into heroes. The gas gave us these powers, but it was also supposed to make our brains easy to control so that Professor Grimm would have an army of superpowered teenagers. But it didn't work that way. We still had free will, and we resisted him. Professor Grimm has tried to capture us and—well…." He faltered, looking distressed. This was obviously something he didn't like talking about.

"Yeah?" Cyborg prompted.

"Well, during our last meeting he tried to _dissect_ us." The Titans gasped. Phantom and Livewire shivered. "Yeah. He wanted to see what he had done wrong. But we escaped. We've been battling ever since."

"That's—that's _awful," _said Beastboy. "I thought Slade was a monster."

"He is," said Robin flatly. "He's just a different kind."

"So what do the other members of your team do?" asked Cyborg. "Their powers, I mean."

"We saw the newscast about you and your friends last night," explained Starfire.

"Oh." Both Phantom and Livewire blushed a little bit. "Well, there's Hotshot; he didn't get the full blast of the gas. He came in after the room had been defumigated and got the residual effect. The effect on him was supposed to make him something just short of Superman, only he couldn't fly or have the cool vision stuff. But since he didn't get the full blast, he got a fraction of the power. Hotshot got enhanced abilities, which means he's stronger, faster, and has more stamina, further vision, more powerful hearing, and can jump farther than normal human beings."

"Mindwave is kind of like Raven," Livewire continued. "She has telekinesis, can communicate telepathically, and read your mind. She and Hotshot are also gymnasts, and Hotshot took karate; they're the ones who taught all of us how to fight. X-ray has x-ray vision, which really isn't much help, but it does come in handy sometimes. Gadget got a power that allows his brain to absorb facts and recall them in a millisecond, and has twice the mental capability of Albert Einstein. He's a supergenius, and our tech wiz. He invented my shoes."

"Um, hate to break it to you, but shoes have been around for quite a while," said Beastboy uncertainly. Livewire laughed, tossing her blonde ponytail.

"No, you goof. These shoes allow me to ride electrical waves in the air so I can fly."

"Oh. I always thought flight came from your powers."

"No, but my powers are what activate the shoes." Suddenly, sirens were heard in the distance.

"Livewire, we've got to go!" Phantom gasped.

"No, wait!" Robin said, grabbing hold of Livewire's arm. "Why are you guys so afraid of the police?"

"Ever heard of Area 51?" asked Phantom. "We've been there, and were lucky to escape alive. That's where they take metahumans to run tests and see what makes them tick. If the government catches us and finds out who we are, the other four are pretty easy to figure out, and then all six of us will be in trouble." With that, Livewire wrenched free of Robin's grip, grabbed Phantom by the arms, and flew off into the sky, disappearing over the rooftops.

"Man," said Cyborg, watching them go. "If I thought I'd have to spend my life in a test tube, I'd be running from the cops too. That's pretty rough."

"Why do we not have to hide from the police?" asked Starfire.

"Justice League protection," said Robin. "Batman convinced them to adopt us as their wards, so the government can't touch us."

"Well, you know what?" asked Beastboy. "At the moment, I'd rather not be around when the police get here either. Let's go home, I've got a lot of work to do."

"Yeah," agreed Robin. "We have to start on this new Slade case."

"Slade case? You wish! _I_ was talking about the thirty algebra problems I've got to do, and I've got no idea how to do them!"


	12. Strange Circumstances

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Chapter 12:

STRANGE CIRCUMSTANCES

Wednesday passed with only a few minor incidents. Beastboy failed his homework assignment horribly while just about everyone else passed with high A's. Robin hit dead ends on every lead he tried to get on Slade. Dick Grayson was invited to Ashley's house to work on their project on Thursday afternoon after school. Otherwise the day passed quietly. There wasn't even any villain trouble, which left the Titans free to do their Algebra homework that Mrs. Underwood had piled on. Poor Beastboy failed that, too.

And then, on Thursday, every weird thing that could have happened, did.

Ashley hardly talked to anyone during first period. This was extraordinarily weird, because even though they had only known Ashley for a few days, the Titans had found that once she started, Ashley would never shut up. Overcome by curiosity, Dick went over and looked over her shoulder.

"Whatcha readin'?" he asked inquisitively, tilting his head to one side. For a moment, Ashley didn't reply. Then she said, "Nothing, really. Just some old stuff."

Looking over her shoulder, Dick could see that it was indeed some old stuff. It was a newspaper article that was dated back six years. The headline read TRAGEDY UNDER THE BIG TOP. Dick gasped and backed away—he knew exactly what the article was about. He remembered reading it when he was eight years old, shortly after the tragic event happened. Dick fought the torrent of memories that pushed against the wall he'd erected to keep them back. This was the same article that had been published shortly after he'd witnessed his parents' murders.

"What's wrong?" Ashley asked, hearing his gasp. He could tell immediately that she was closely examining his reaction. Her blue eyes were sparking strangely. Her gaze was so fierce that Dick couldn't meet it honestly.

"N-nothing," he stammered at the ground, and turned and walked away quickly.

Dick sat down, his thoughts whirring. Why did Ashley have an article about the murder of his parents?

Kori was sitting a few seats away, talking and laughing with Gar. She came over and sat by Dick, and noticed immediately that he was upset.

"Dick, what is the matter?" she asked, genuinely concerned. Suddenly, the bell rang.

"It's nothing," he muttered, and hurried out of the class.

Language Arts was every bit as strange as Algebra. The next article Dick caught Ashley reading was about Bruce Wayne and his young ward.

"What are you doing?" he asked, exasperated.

"Just reading," Ashley replied innocently. "Why?"

"I just find it a little weird that you're reading old newspaper articles. Any particular reason why?" Dick was feeling very apprehensive all of the sudden. Ashley tossed her hair and gave him a fey grin.

"Let's just say that I'm trying to solve a mystery," she replied. "Hey, you're still coming over this afternoon, right?"

"Yeah."

"Good." Without another word, Ashley turned back to the article, leaving Dick frustrated at the fact that he had gleaned more questions than answers from her.

Dick was bothered all period. He couldn't understand why Ashley was suddenly picking up old newspaper articles about his past, but he had a nasty feeling that he was going to find out soon.

On their way out of Language Arts, Dick's elbow accidentally caught on Ashley's binder, sending the contents flying across the floor. Murmuring an apology, Dick stooped to help her pick them up. What he found disturbed him more than anything else that day.

_"Batman's New Sidekick?" _he read off of one headline, raising his eyebrows. He lifted another. _"Batman and Robin Stump the Riddler?_ What's all this about?" Dick shuffled through the pile of papers, scanning articles about Bruce Wayne, Batman and Robin, and the Teen Titans.

"Nothing, nothing," Ashley said brusquely, scooping the papers back into her binder.

"It doesn't look like nothing." Dick purposefully stood in the doorway, blocking her path and letting her know silently that she wasn't leaving until she told him what was going on.

"I'm just a little curious about the local superhero groups, you know?" Ashley shrugged. "We had a bunch of teenage superheroes in Rachel, too. I wanted to do a little research on the Titans here. They're pretty cool, don't you think?"

"Well, I can't really argue," Dick replied, smiling inwardly. "But what about the Batman thing?"

"Oh, him. It's not really Batman I'm after. It's Robin."

Right there. She had definitely tried to catch his eyes, her gaze cool and controlled, yet probing for a reaction. Dick kept his face blank, not sure what game she was playing, but determined to win it.

"I find him fascinating," Ashley continued, watching Dick's face carefully. "Going from sidekick to leader is a pretty big deal; I was just sort of wondering how it happened. Aren't you just a little curious?"

"Not particularly, no," Dick replied coldly. Something was going on, something bad, he was sure.

"Hey," Mr. Killingsworth called from his desk. "You two had better be heading off to class. Wouldn't want to be late!"

"No, sir!" Ashley replied cheerfully, and she pushed past Dick, knocking his shoulder with hers and giving him a crafty smile, like a fox in a henhouse. Dick watched as she disappeared down the hallway, his eyes narrowed. Dick had a vague hunch at what was going on, and if he was right (which he normally was) something very bad was about to happen…


	13. My Locker Electrocuted Me

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

CHAPTER 13:

"My Locker Electrocuted Me."

As they ran their laps in Gym that day, Dick couldn't keep his mind off of Ashley. What was she up to? Why was she suddenly so interested in the Titans, and Batman and Robin? He pondered these questions and more as he jogged, watching the blonde's ponytail thump rhythmically on her back as she ran ahead.

Conversation was a little strained between them as they walked around the field for the rest of the period. Dick and Logan were unusually cool towards Ashley; apparently, she hadn't told Logan what was going on either. The other Titans kept looking at Dick oddly, seeing that he wasn't his normal, at least semi-perky self. Only Joey was acting normally, chattering nonstop and walking backwards so he could move and talk to them at the same time.

In the locker room at the end of the period, Vic and Gar trapped Dick on his way out the door.

"Okay, spill it," said Victor, bracing his arms on the doorframe so Dick couldn't pass.

"Huh?"

"Something's going on, Dick. You can't hide it from us," Gar told him, folding his arms over his small chest. "Your eyes are really easy to read without your mask on. What's up?"

After a moment of hesitation, Dick dragged them over to a corner and in a hushed voice told them everything.

"…And I've got absolutely no idea what she's playing at, and it's driving me insane!" he finished, panting slightly from the speed he'd been talking. It felt good to vent his frustration to somebody.

"I don't know what to tell you, dude," Victor shrugged. "Except to be careful when you're at Ashley's house today."

"Great, that helps a lot," Dick muttered. Gar looked around curiously.

"Did anybody see Joey leave?" he asked. Dick and Victor shook their heads. With a shrug, Gar turned to leave, when suddenly he paused, his ears perked.

"What?"

"I heard something. Like a banging, over here." Gar led them over to the other side of the locker room. There were very few people left in the room, and the banging was coming from one of the lockers. A muffled voice called out.

"Is anybody out there? Can anybody hear me? Let me out!"

"It's Joey!" Gar exclaimed. The other two looked alarmed.

"We've got to get him out," Dick said. He looked around nervously. "Darn it, if I'd only thought to bring my lock pick."

"We'll just have to do this the old fashioned way," said Victor quietly. Making sure no one was looking their way, Victor reached down and, using his inhuman strength, wrenched the locker open. A very disheveled Joey tumbled out, his legs and arms bent tightly by his sides because of the tiny lockers.

"Thanks," he said, taking a deep breath.

"Who did this to you?" demanded Dick.

"Bradley and his friends. They snuck up on me while I was changing and shoved me in and locked it."

"They aren't going to get away with this," Gar snarled.

"Oh, no, it's okay!" Joey grinned. The other three stared at him, incredulous. He'd just been shoved and locked into a locker, and this was _okay?_ "I probably deserved it. I normally do."

"Say what?" asked Victor.

"Why would you deserve to get pushed into a locker?" inquired Dick.

"I don't know, but I'm sure I did something to upset him. It's probably my fault. No worries!" Joey gave them a grin, grabbed his bag, and hurried from the room, perky as ever. Dick shook his head, disbelieving.

"I swear, that kid just keeps getting weirder and weirder," he sighed. The other two agreed, and together they left the locker room.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Sixth period was spent in the computer lab, researching their animals. Ashley and Dick had argued furiously over what animal they would do, because they both liked a multitude of them. Finally they settled on the jaguar, which they both rather liked. Dick was careful to choose a computer across from Ashley, so they could converse freely but he could avoid her seeing exactly what he was looking at. As soon as they sat down to the computer, Dick opened up a search engine and typed in "Phantom, Livewire, Gadget, Hotshot, Mindwave, X-Ray."

It was time for a little research of his own.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Because the computer lab was pretty far from the freshman hallway, Mr. Abbott released them before the bell so the students could run to their lockers. Gar, Ashley, Dick and Cole, one of the twins, walked together to their lockers. Cole broke off at the beginning of the hall, but the others had lockers farther down and kept walking.

"…. So lucky us, we got stuck with the _giraffe,"_ moaned Gar. "I mean, I've got nothing _against _giraffes, but I would have preferred to do my project on something with fangs."

"Aw, you poor thing," Ashley teased. "Get over it. You're whining like a baby."

Dick rolled his eyes at the pair of them and reached out to open his and Gar's locker. Ashley was already fiddling with the knob on hers. Gar was looking a little ticked off about the jab, but then he got a crafty gleam in his eye. He snuck up behind Ashley and tickled her under the arms. Ashley let out a yelp of surprise, and suddenly both boys cried out in pain.

Dick wasn't sure what happened to Gar, but as soon as Ashley had yelped a surge of electricity had blasted through his locker, straight into his hand. It flowed through his body in a constant stream, and although he tried Dick couldn't pull away. He yelled in agony. Ashley gasped; the stream of electricity ebbed, allowing Dick to break free. He staggered back and then sank to his knees, trembling horribly.

"Ouch!" Gar exclaimed, his fingers in his mouth. "You shocked me. What's wrong, Dick?"

"I…I think my locker just _electrocuted _me," he gasped, clenching and unclenching his fist. His hand was burning like he was holding a white-hot coal.

"Oh no, Dick, I'm so sorry!" Ashley squealed, looking horrified.

"What are you talking about?" Dick asked, a little dazed from the shock. Ashley didn't reply. Instead, she dropped by his side and pulled his hand toward her. Dick jerked it back involuntarily, wincing.

"Here, let me see," she scolded, prying his fingers open. Gar leaned over her shoulder to look. He let out a low whistle upon seeing Dick's scorched palm. It was a flaming red, and the burn was so bad the heat from it could be felt from an inch away.

"Ouch," said Gar.  
"Ouch," Dick agreed weakly.

"Oh, Dick, I'm so sorry!" Ashley said again, biting her lip in distress.

"It's okay. I mean, it's not like _you _did it or anything." Dick watched her reaction carefully. She jumped a little and purposefully avoided his eyes.

The bell rang, and kids began to pour out of their classrooms. Ashley, Dick and Gar were attracting very odd looks because they were all still sitting on the floor. They scrambled to their feet and hastily gathered their books. Dick's left palm smarted painfully when he touched anything, so he had to balance his books in the crook of his arm.

_Good thing I'm right-handed,_ he thought wryly, trying to avoid contact with anything for the sake of his burning palm.

Seventh period passed without much incident. Luckily for Dick and Logan, the detention monitor didn't seem to care one way or another if her charges stayed the whole time, so she hadn't mentioned their absence to Mr. Tatum. Dick, Logan and Stephen talked together when they had time. Dick kept his hand in his pocket, thanking God for baggy shorts. He didn't let on that he was in any pain, and neither of the other two seemed to notice that his hand stayed out of sight.

"How's your hand?" Gar asked him once Dick arrived at their locker. Dick pulled it from his pocket to show him. If anything, the burn had worsened, and skin was beginning to peel.

"I can't feel it anymore," Dick told him, more than a little worried. "I don't know what to do about it."

"Do about what?" asked Raven, coming up behind them. It had become a habit for her to join them at their locker as soon as school let out. After quickly recounting what had happened, Dick showed her his hand. Raven let out a low whistle.

"Does it hurt really badly?"

"It did earlier. Now I can't feel it."

"That's not good," Raven frowned. "Do you want me to heal it?"

"Could you?" asked Dick, relieved.

"If I can put your bones back together after that motorcycle accident, I can sure as heck heal something like this. But it's going to hurt a little bit."

Dick told her quite certainly that he didn't care if it hurt or not, and Gar was put on lookout just so no one would see what they were doing. Raven took his hand in hers and turned the palm up. She gently brushed the wound with her fingers.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos," she said softly. There was a flash of pain so intense that Dick had to make an effort not to cry out, and suddenly his hand was back to normal. The angry red flesh had mended over into new skin. Dick took his hand back and flexed it experimentally.

"Thanks," he said, sighing with relief.

"Don't mention it," Raven smirked.

The three of them left for the bus, but halfway down the hallway they were stopped by Ashley and Logan. They could be heard arguing twenty feet away.

"I swear, Logan, it's worse than the one you had!"

"Are you sure?"

"Positive! I mean, it went all red and hot and it sure looked painful."

"Well, we'll look. But in all honesty, I think you're exaggerating."

"What's up?" Gar asked as they approached Ashley and Logan.

"Hi, Gar," smiled Ashley. "Hey, Dick, do you mind if we have another look at your burn?"

Dick gulped. _Crap!_ He hadn't thought about this. He was going over to Ashley's house—there would be no way for her to miss the fact that his hand had suddenly and miraculously healed itself. Better try to fake his way out.

"Um… I'd really prefer it if you didn't. I mean, it still hurts pretty badly—"

"I'll be careful, I promise." Without warning, Ashley reached out and grabbed his left hand, flipping the palm up. Her face went from astonished to suspicious to triumphant in the span of two seconds.

"What happened to your burn, Dick?" she asked in a deathly calm voice. Dick turned as red as his hand had been not five minutes ago.

"I, um… well, you see—"

"You're certainly a fast healer, aren't you?" she asked coolly, studying his face. Dick tried not to, but he looked away when she tried to meet his eyes.

"Yeah, guess I am." He pulled his hand back and jammed it deep into his baggy pocket.

"Well, I guess I'll see you on the bus, then." Ashley gave a smug smile before turning and striding quickly down the hall, Logan following, looking bewildered. Dick had gone from flaming red to pale white.

"She knows," he gasped, his blue eyes wide with panic. "Holy crap, she knows, she's figured it out."

"Am I the _only _one who has very little idea of what's going on?" Raven snapped. Dick and Gar quickly explained how Ashley had been researching Robin all day, along with Dick Grayson and the Teen Titans, and how she'd been dropping cryptic hints all day.

"… And I'll eat my gym socks if she didn't just figure out that you're Raven of the Titans, even if you look different, because there's no other way I could have healed that fast," Dick finished. Raven's mouth was hanging open, which would have been incredibly funny if not for the present circumstances.

"This is _bad_, Dick. No, this is _beyond _bad. What if she blabs it to the whole school about who we are? Not only is _our _cover blown, but so is Bruce's!" A light bulb flickered above them, and Raven immediately calmed herself down. "I seriously don't think you should go over to her house this afternoon."

"I have to," Dick argued, shaking his head. "If I don't, she'll know for sure. Besides, I think I've got a secret weapon on her."

"What?"

"I'm not saying anything just yet. I'm not entirely sure I'm right." Ignoring his friends' exasperated glares, Dick hurried off down the hallway. He stopped short, however, upon passing a classroom. Dick pressed himself to the doorframe and listened. Logan and Ashley were inside.

"See?" Ashley asked excitedly. "This _proves_ that I'm right!"

"I hate to agree with you, but there doesn't seem to be much doubt about it." Logan paused. "So, what do we do about it?"

"Leave it to me. I've got a plan."

"Just try to break it to him as gently as possible. I've only got half an idea about what's going on, Sparky, but from what you've told me this might freak him out."

_Break what to me gently?_ Dick wondered, who had already figured out that he was the topic of the conversation. _And did Logan just call her Sparky?_

"You worry too much, Casper," said Ashley. Judging by her tone, Dick could tell she was flashing Logan one of her famous all-knowing smirks. Footsteps announced that they were coming out. Dick pushed off from the doorframe and joined the mass of students migrating out to the bus lane. By the time Ashley and Logan got on the bus, it was as though Dick had been there the whole time.


	14. Secrets Revealed

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

READ THIS FIRST!!!!!!!

Okay, so up till now I've toed the line concerning the Titans and their pasts, but I'm going to be honest and say that I've taken a bit of creative license with Robin's past and family. Please, bear with me and don't throw rotten vegetables. It's kind of dramatic, but the last people who read this liked it. Here's hoping you will, too.

Okay. Now you can read it. I would like to give kudos to **Broken Sword of the Morning**, who figured it out first.

Chapter 14:

Secrets Revealed

Dick tried his best to act normally on the bus, but he was still a little cold towards Ashley. If she noticed any difference in him, she didn't let on. Logan, however, kept looking at Dick oddly, as though there was something different about the raven-haired teen that he hadn't quite picked up on. Dick noticed, and he didn't like it at all.

Before heading off with Ashley, Dick paused to talk with his friends for a brief moment.

"So what do we do if the city needs us?" asked Gar.

"I'm sure you guys can handle just about every villain in the city without me," Dick told them. "But I'll probably find some way out and show up anyway."

"Robin…." Dick turned and saw Kori looking at him, her green eyes full of concern. "Raven has told me all of what has transpired. I worry for your safety."

"Don't worry, Star," he told her, smiling. "I'll be fine. If it comes to a fight, I can take Ashley no problem."

"Why would it come to a fight?" Raven asked, her eyes narrowed. Dick grinned cleverly and replied, "It's a surprise," before saying good-bye and following Ashley and Logan down the road.

Logan and Ashley lived within two blocks of each other, so Logan walked with them most of the way. He finally broke off at a red brick house with a rather thick tree in the front yard and a calico cat on the front stoop. It rubbed its head around Logan's ankles as he walked up the front steps, shouting a farewell to his friends. Dick and Ashley walked on.

Ashley's house was a bluish color; a straight rectangle squashed between two other houses of very much the same design, traditional of most of the homes in the city. Ashley's house, however, had a fenced-in backyard, and the wood shook with the force of something very large detained behind it. Dick stopped short on the front walk and stared. Ashley laughed.

"Don't worry," she giggled. "Those are just my dogs." She lifted her head and let loose a call that rang through the street: "Puuupppppppiiiiiieeeeessss!" She was answered by a sequence of very loud, booming barks. Dick blinked.

"_Big_ puppies," he muttered, before following her through the door.

The house was cluttered, but comfortably so. The front hall was small and had doorways leading off into a dining room and a staircase. The sounds of a television set came from the second floor, along with something that sounded like cars crashing together.

"My little brother," Ashley explained. "He's a nightmare, but he's busy at the moment. If we're lucky, he'll leave us alone."

They dumped their backpacks by the couch in the living room. There was more noise coming from the kitchen: the clinking of pots and pans, and running water.

"Mom, I'm home!" Ashley called.

"That's nice, dear," a voice from the kitchen replied. "Is your friend with you?"

"Yes, Mom. I'm going to show him the dogs."

"You're supposed to be working on a project."

"We _will!_ Just let us have some fun first." Ashley grabbed Dick's arm and steered him over to the back door. She opened it up and stepped out onto the porch, pulling Dick with her.

At first there was nothing, just a lawn of neat green grass. And then two _enormous _dogs came tearing around the corner of the house, tails wagging furiously. They panted happily at the sight of their owner, but then they saw Dick. With joyous yelps, they barreled toward him, tackling his legs and pinning him to the ground.

For a few moments, Dick's world consisted of dog breath, dog slobber, and wet noses. He was pinned to the ground not only by the huge Great Danes sitting on his chest, but with laughter as the humongous dogs licked his ears, tickling them to no end.

"Ack, call them off, call them off!" he finally managed to choke out, giggling hysterically as one of them planted a long, sloppy kiss on his cheek.

"Scout! Molly! Back!" The dogs gave no clear intention of following their master's orders, and Ashley had to grab hold of their collars and haul them off of Dick. He picked himself up, still laughing. Molly and Scout strained against their collars, whining plaintively.

"Sorry," Ashley giggled.

"No you aren't. You knew they'd do that," Dick retorted, grinning.

"Well, maybe I did. What are you going to do about it?" Ashley smirked. "I'll just let the dogs loose again."

"No, I'll get you later." Dick knelt down and massaged the dogs' ears. He loved dogs. "Which one is which?"

"The bigger one is Scout, and the smaller one is Molly." She gave their collars a gentle shake as she said their names. "They were only playing. They do that to everyone I bring back here."

"Think you could've gotten a bigger breed?"

"What's wrong? Don't you like big dogs?" asked Ashley, sinking to his level and pulling back as her dogs strained to lick her face.

"No, I'm a dog person. I don't like the little ones, though."

"Birds of a feather, us two," Ashley mused. Dick watched her face carefully, but it didn't seem as though she'd made the pun consciously. "Ah well. Let's go work on that project, shall we?"

After giving each of the dogs a pat on the head, the two of them returned inside and pulled out their research to begin their projects. They got off to a fairly good start, too, until Ashley's mother called out.

"Ashley, sweetheart, I need you to put away the dishes for me."

"But _Mo-om!" _she whined from where she was lying on her stomach on the floor. "I have a guest! Can't I do it later?"

"Ashley Elizabeth Thompson," her mother scolded from the kitchen. "A few dishes aren't going to take too long. I've already washed them and everything, I just need you to put them in the cabinet."

"I don't want to!"

"Don't make me come in there, young lady."

Dick, who had been following the conversation with amusement and wondering if he'd ever had a similar argument with his mother, was rather surprised when Ashley flashed him a grin and said, "Come on, then!" Dick shook his head, smiling, and turned back to his paper as he heard footsteps coming from the kitchen.

"Ashley, you get in there right now. I'm sure your friend will excuse you for a moment."

"Go on, Ash, I can wait. It'll only take a—" At this point, Dick looked up from his work to glance, out of pure curiosity, at Ashley's mother, and his breath caught in his chest.

Mrs. Thompson was tall and thin, clad in jeans and a T-shirt and holding a towel as though she'd been drying off a dish. Her face was elegantly angled and framed by a sheet of sleek black hair that dropped far down her back. She was smiling at him in a way that seemed painfully familiar. Dick felt his heart pounding in his chest as he fully comprehended what he was seeing.

The woman looked exactly like his mother.

For a few moments the Dick just stared at her. Gradually Mrs. Thompson's smile faded, and her eyebrows knit together in a look of concern. Ashley's gaze kept flitting from one to the other, a little alarmed.

"Dick? Are you okay? You just went white as a sheet."

For a moment, Dick couldn't find his voice, and his gaze never left the woman in the doorway.

"I'm fine," he finally managed to get out. "Um, Ashley, I've—I've got to go. I forgot, I have—stuff to do…." His voice cracked as he said the last bit. Dick began to cram his things into his backpack, shoving the papers in clumsily. His hands were trembling horribly, and he fumbled with the zipper.

"Stuff to do?" asked Ashley, a little angry. "You told me you had all afternoon!"

"I know, I'm really sorry, but I've got to go." Dick shouldered his backpack and made for the front door.

"Young man—Dick, isn't it? Is something wrong? Do you need a ride?" Mrs. Thompson asked.

Oh, that voice was so familiar! Dick's voice wavered as he replied, "No ma'am, I'll walk, but thank you." He hurried toward the front door, wrenched it open and let it bang shut behind him as he scrambled down the front walk.

"Dick!"

Ashley ran up behind him. She grabbed hold of his shoulder and spun him around. Dick glared at her furiously but did not meet her gaze.

"Dick, I'm sorry, I didn't know it would affect you like that. I should have just told you—Dick, I know everything—"

"Let—me—GO!" Dick pulled away from her and began to run, clearing the front gate in a single jump, running as fast and as far as his feet would take him. And when Ashley shouted his name one last time behind him, it only made him run faster.

Dick sprinted down the street and hooked a left, along another row of houses. Passerby sprang back to allow the raven-haired teen to tear past. Dick ran until he reached a more run-down part of the city, where the streets were empty. It was only then that he ducked into an alley, threw his backpack against the wall, and collapsed against it, burying his head in his hands and sobbing.

Most of the time, Dick could go from day to day without thinking about his parents too much. He'd learned long ago that dragging up the past would just make him miserable. But he'd never expected to see the _mirror image _of his mom in Ashley's house. Dick hiccupped and pulled his knees up to his chest, hugging them to him sadly. The old wound that had been torn the night his parents were killed had opened up again, bleeding anew, releasing pent-up sorrow and longing and allowing the memories to break through.

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Dick could remember every detail of that horrible night. How he'd heard Mr. Haley, the circus owner, arguing with Tony Zucco, about insurance or some other stupid thing like that. He remembered Zucco's threat, and how it had frightened him, but he didn't tell anyone. Of course, he was just a stupid little eight year old at the time—how could he have known? Still, whenever the most painful memory of all came forth—the image of his parents falling, hand-in-hand, toward the hard-packed ground far below as Dick stood, frozen in horror, in the arena—he couldn't help but blame himself.

He remembered how he'd sat numbly on a bench outside the tent, after about a straight hour of crying. Someone had draped a blanket around his shoulders, more for the comforting weight than warmth. Dick remembered how Batman—_the _Batman—had interrogated him, and Dick had told him everything he knew, and insisted that he help find the one responsible. But no—Dick, without any family in the area, was sent to the orphanage the day after. Pop Haley couldn't take him in, even though he'd wanted to, so Dick was left to wait and see if anybody came for him. But Dick had no living relatives. His parents' deaths had left him alone in the world. Soon after reaching the orphanage, three days in fact, he'd been legally adopted by Bruce Wayne, and of course the rest was history. But during those days, those horrible three days of being an _orphan_, Dick had learned that he _did_ have relatives still living.

He'd snuck out of bed to get a drink of water. Although he was still guilt-ridden and sorrowful, he'd felt a pinprick of pride for sneaking out of his room without waking the other orphans. He crept down the stairs stealthily, making his way toward the kitchen. But suddenly he heard adult voices in a room adjacent to the hallway, and he'd crouched in the shadows, waiting for them to pass. The conversation still rang fresh in his memory.

"Were you able to get in touch with Mary's sister?" asked Mrs. Tinnerman, the social worker who'd brought Dick here. It was that simple sentence that had caused Dick to listen intently: Mary was his mother. He'd never known she'd had a sister.

"Yes," sighed Mr. Williams, the orphanage caretaker.

"And?"

"She doesn't want him."

This, to Dick, was relatively new information, and aside from being a little hurt that his mother's sister didn't care for him, he was extremely curious. Of course, it could be another Mary.

Mrs. Tinnerman gasped. "Why not?"

"She was dodgy about it. She was saying that her financial situation couldn't support another kid—she already had two of her own. But she was really short with me when it came to Mary. She didn't seem to want to talk about her."

"Grief," said Mrs. Tinnerman sympathetically.

"I don't think that was it," sighed Williams. They were silent for a while.

"So what do we do with the boy?" asked Mrs. Tinnerman quietly.

"I have no idea," Williams replied. "Hold him here, I guess. I didn't expect that we'd have to keep him."

"Hasn't anyone offered to adopt him?"

"No. Why would they? Everyone who comes here is looking for some bright, happy child who'd be just tickled pink to come home with them. All that kid does is sit on the edge of his cot, staring at the wall like he's already dead. Which, if he doesn't start eating again soon, might just be a possibility."

"But _no one _has asked about him? He's such a sweet little boy—"

"_No,_ Sarah," Williams snapped, aggravated. "Let's face it. No one wants Richard Grayson."

It wasn't until Mr. Williams said that that Dick understood. He was here because no one wanted him. Not even his own family. He would grow up in this orphanage because no one in their right mind would want to adopt a child like him. He was totally alone.

Dick had waited until Mr. Williams and Mrs. Tinnerman finished their conversation and walked away before he slipped out of the shadows and went back to bed, his drink forgotten. None of the other orphans woke all night—Dick made sure that the pillow muffled his sobs.

By the time the other orphans had woken, Dick had cried himself out, and promised himself that he would not cry again anytime soon. He'd done too much crying in the past week. He'd also made a hard pact with himself: he didn't care if his mother's sister didn't want him. If she didn't want him, if her family didn't want him, if the whole _world_ didn't want him—then he didn't want them either.

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Dick was jolted from his memories by a buzzing sound. Wiping his eyes on the back of his hand, scolding himself for crying, he pulled out his communicator. It vibrated in the palm of his hand, and he opened it.

"What?"

"Dude, Cinderblock's down here makin' a mess. We need a little help." Beastboy's features disappeared for a moment as he ducked to avoid a boulder.

"Where are you?"

"Downtown, Pine Street. Hey, have you been _crying?"_ Beastboy looked absolutely shocked—he didn't know Robin _did_ crying.

"No!" Robin snapped forcefully, digging his mask out of his pocket and putting it on over his eyes so his teammate couldn't see. "I'm fine, and I'm on my way." He terminated the link before Beastboy could reply.

Robin changed into his costume quickly and darted out of the alley. He knew his friends could handle Cinderblock on their own, but he still wanted to be there. Not because he could help in any way, but because he had to talk to someone who would soon show up as well.

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"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" shouted Raven, and sent a truck barreling into Cinderblock. The villain roared furiously as the truck found its mark and sent him flying twenty feet away. Starfire swooped in, firing starbolts, which Cinderblock tried to block with a massive arm. Cyborg let loose a blast from his sonic cannon which hit Cinderblock in the gut and Beastboy morphed into a T-rex and smashed his tail into Cinderblock's chest. With a groan, the monolithic criminal sank to the ground and lay still after a battle that had nearly dragged on for a full hour. The street they'd been fighting on was completely destroyed. Luckily, the Titans were far down Pine Street, closer to the ghettos. No one would be using this part of the street too much.

"Finally!" panted Beastboy. "I was about ready to say screw it and go home. Let Phantom and Livewire handle it."

"They haven't even showed up yet," frowned Raven, looking toward the sky. "Neither has Robin."

"You do not think they have come to harm?" asked Starfire anxiously, hovering some ten feet overhead.

"No. Here they come right now." Cyborg pointed; Livewire, carrying Phantom, was shooting low over the rooftops toward them. Robin was running through the street, coming in the opposite direction.

"Aw!" said Livewire, dropping Phantom and then touching down herself. "You guys had the party without us."

"Hey, next time, if you want the villain all to yourselves, be our guest!" said Beastboy with a grin, sliding over beside her.

"Who's this?" Phantom pointed at the stony criminal.

"Cinderblock. Dumb as a post, but pretty dang strong, and not much fun to go up against," Cyborg replied.

"I thought you said you needed help," said Robin, coming up beside them. Livewire looked at him, her electric-blue eyes narrowed.

"We did," Raven told him. "But then Starfire dropped a dumpster on his head and he ran around banging into the buildings. It tired him out pretty quickly, and it was easy to beat him from there."

"Good." Robin looked around, meeting everyone's eyes, and locking his gaze with Livewire's for a long moment. "You guys can go on home. I'll stay here with Cinderblock and wait for the police to show up."

"You sure?" asked Cyborg. "Beastboy told us you looked upset—"

"I'm sure," Robin replied, giving Cyborg a look that told him quite plainly to shut up and go away. With a shrug, Cyborg turned to the others and said, "You heard the man. Let's go home so I can get my three victories on the Gamestation in on BB."

"Dude, I've got _homework!"_ whined Beastboy.

"Didn't stop you yesterday."

"Well, I've got more tonight! But if you're going to be that way, I guess I can kick your butt _once_." With that parting shot, Beastboy morphed into a hawk and took to the skies, circling overhead.

"Guess that's it for tonight, then," said Phantom, watching Beastboy. "Come on, Sparky, time to go."

"You go ahead," Livewire replied, still glaring coolly at Robin. "I want to talk to Robin." Phantom's jaw dropped.

"But I need you to fly me home!" he objected.

"You can walk."

"It's _three miles!"_

"You could use the exercise." Livewire stopped replying to Phantom's objections then, and finally, with a furious sigh, he turned invisible. His retreating shadow showed them all that he was leaving. Starfire, Raven and Cyborg looked at Robin, bewildered.

"You sure you want to do this?" Cyborg whispered.

"I'm sure."

"Robin, be careful," Starfire pleaded.

"I will. Don't worry." Raven laughed; almost every time he said that, the Titans had a _very _big cause for worry soon afterward. But she said nothing, and instead created a black disk of magic for Cyborg to ride on, and without another word the three of them followed Beastboy as he winged his way homeward.

Livewire waited until the Titans were nothing more than specks in the sky before she acted. She floated toward Robin, stopping about a yard away, and folded her arms, a smug smile playing across her face.

"Grayson."

"Thompson."

Livewire's smile dropped into a look of astonishment. "When did you figure out my secret identity?"

"At about the same time you figured out mine," Robin returned coldly. "Raised by the world's greatest detective, remember?"

"Yes, I remember." She hovered a few inches off the ground, drifting around him in a circle. "We're very alike, you and I, _Dick."_

"How do you figure?"

"Both superheroes. We're the same age, the same height. We think in similar patterns. We even look something alike." She smirked. "I suppose it runs in the family."

Robin felt the blood rush to his face. "What do you mean?" he asked, playing for time.

"I think you already know, but I feel like telling you anyway." Ashley stopped hovering and stood facing him. "Your mother's name was Mary Summers. Your father's name was Jonathan Grayson."

"Leave my parents out of this," Robin warned in a deathly quiet voice.

"They were acrobats in the Haley Brother's Circus," Livewire continued. "You were part of the act. When you were eight years old, they were killed by mobster Tony Zucco. You escaped alive, but had no one to take you in. Four days after the accident, young Richard Grayson was adopted by millionaire Bruce Wayne."

"Shut up!"

"Soon afterward, Robin hits the scene as Batman's sidekick. Together they track down Zucco and convict him for the murder of the Flying Graysons. Robin stays on as Batman's sidekick for another five years."

"I said SHUT UP!" Robin threw a Bird-a-rang at Livewire, but with a delighted laugh she used her powers to take control of the metal and sent it back at him twice as hard. Robin dodged it easily and dove at her, but Livewire shot into the air.

"But then Robin gets tired of being in the shadow of the Bat. At thirteen, he runs away and lives on the streets of Jump City until he forms his own superhero team. At the same time Batman starts protecting Gotham solo, Bruce Wayne sends his little adopted son to a boarding school in Britain." She sighed. "Once I had the outside of the puzzle, filling in the rest was all too easy. All you had to do was give your name."

"How did you make these connections?" Robin yelled furiously. "No one else could never have done this without having a huge amount of sheer luck. How did you use my name to get all of this information?"

"Because unknown to little Dick Grayson, he _did_ still have family after his parents died!" Livewire returned. She was really enjoying this. "Rebecca Summers and Mary Summers never _did_ get along, even though they were so much alike. Although Rebecca was two years older than Mary, the sisters were almost impossible to tell apart. Black hair, blue eyes—they were constantly getting mixed up. They hated it. That's why when Rebecca moved out and Mary went off to college, neither sister spoke to each other except for holidays. And then, after the girls got married and their parents died, they didn't speak to each other at all. They didn't even _mention _each other! So their children grew up, until the oldest in each family was eight years old, and then Mary and her husband were killed on the trapeze."

"Stop! I don't want to hear anymore!" Robin covered his ears with his hands, but he couldn't keep from hearing what Livewire was yelling.

"After Mary died, Rebecca talked about her constantly—about how they'd fought over the years, how much they _hated_ each other. Hated each other so much that Rebecca wouldn't even take her own sister's child in." Livewire's hair was frizzing in excitement, and sparks shot off and hit the street. A streetlight exploded. "I am the child of Mark Thompson and Rebecca Summers, sister of Mary Grayson!" She flew down to Robin's level. "Don't you see, Dick? My mother and your mother were _sisters. _That means we're _cousins!"_

"SHUT UP!" Livewire's story had made something inside of him burst. Robin attacked her, punching and kicking, shouting all the while. Livewire struggled to block his blows, and returned with a few of her own.

"We're not family! Families love you, families care! When my parents died, did your mother care? NO! I'll bet you didn't, either! Didn't care that your cousin was wishing he were dead, would have preferred death to living! You don't know what it's like, growing up under the impression that nobody wants you! You don't know what it's like to feel totally alone! You don't know me, and you _aren't my cousin!"_

"YES—I—AM!" With that, Ashley let a blast of electricity rip through her, throwing Dick against the wall. "There's no sense in denying it, _Dick_. I know who you are, and I know who the others are too! If you decide you want to keep fighting me, I can tell the whole world that Dick Grayson, Kori Anders, Victor Stone, Raven Allen and Garfield Logan are the Teen Titans!"

A window banged somewhere in one of the nearby houses. Robin and Livewire glanced around, but they saw nothing and brushed it away. There were more important matters to be dealt with.

"Oh no you won't!" Robin shouted at her. "You won't, because I know who _you _are, and I know who your teammates are too!" Livewire gasped.

"You don't!"

"I do," Robin replied icily, finally calming down now that he had an advantage. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded pile of papers, which he'd printed out in the computer lab that day. "See for yourself," he snapped, and threw them to Livewire. Livewire unfolded the papers to see her friends and herself in their disguises, helping to fight a fire. "You gave yourself away by telling Dick _and_ Robin all about your friends. Tim is the gymnast and the karate whiz. That means he's Hotshot, the genetically enhanced human. Julia is a gymnast too, which means she'd have to be Mindwave. You're obviously Livewire, so X-Ray would have to be your friend Laura. Logan is Phantom, so Gill must be Gadget." He grinned at Livewire's horrorstruck expression. "Face it, _Ashley_; if you give away my friends and I, I can give you away just as easily! And the stakes are a lot higher for you."

"You wouldn't dare," Ashley snarled, her eyes glowing yellow. "You'd kill us all!"

"Are you willing to take the risk?"

"You wouldn't," she said, no longer angry, but scared.

"Try me," Robin said quietly. Livewire's eyes stopped glowing, the rage in within them replaced by pure hatred. They stood there, staring at each other, for a long time. Then the faint sounds of sirens began to ring in the distance.

"Here come the cops," Robin smirked, folding his arms. "I don't think you want to be found here. So, Ashley, what's it going to be?"

Livewire did not reply, but for a few more moments she continued to glare at him, her gaze telling Robin that she would like nothing better than to see him drop dead where he stood. Then she threw the papers into the air and blasted them with a lightning bolt, turning them into nothing more than ashes. That done, she shot up flew away, going so fast that she looked like a lightning bolt.

The sirens got louder, and Robin could see the lights on the tops of the police cars. It suddenly occurred to him that he didn't want to be here when the police showed up, either. He pulled out his grappling hook and swung to the top of one of the buildings, a small apartment complex of sorts. Before the police cars even crested the hill the battle had raged behind, Robin had gone, vanished like a shadow in the darkness.

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The other Titans had demanded to know what the heck Livewire had wanted, and Robin was too tired to refuse. Plopping down on the couch, looking at the floor, he told them everything—from his visit to Ashley's house to the end of the fight they'd had. He even told them that he and Ashley were cousins, and more difficult still, the story of his parent's deaths…

There were a few minutes of silence following Robin's story. Robin buried his face in his hands, feeling exhausted and drained, but churning with emotions he was having difficulty controlling. Starfire slipped a comforting arm around his shoulders.

_"Whoa," _said Raven finally.

"Yeah," Cyborg added, awestruck. "This is a lot bigger than I thought it would be. You don't think she'll tell anyone about us, do you?"

"No," replied Robin hollowly.

"Why not?"

_Because I wouldn't, _thought Robin. _I know what it's like to carry that kind of secret. I wouldn't want to put anyone in danger like that. And she's just like me. _Instead, he answered, "Because we know the identities of her teammates. If we told, they'd all have to go into hiding, probably even leave the country."

"You know what this means, don't you?" asked Beastboy. Everyone looked at him. "I don't have to feel bad about liking both Ashley _and _Livewire because they're the same person! Do you think Ashley'll go out with me if I asked?"

If looks could kill, Beastboy would have been pinned to the wall with daggers from four different people.

"Just a thought," he muttered, blushing a little bit.

"Are you all right, Robin?" asked Starfire gently, giving her best friend's shoulder a squeeze.

"I'm fine," he answered. Robin got up, shrugging her arm off. "I just need a little time to think. I'm going to bed. I'm fine," he repeated, seeing the sympathetic looks his friends were giving him. Robin turned and walked out of the living room to the stairs and up to his bedroom.

But as the other Titans could plainly see, Robin was not fine. He could lie to himself, but he couldn't lie to them. Raven left a plate of food out beside his door, and returned a few hours later to find it untouched. And Beastboy may have been imagining it, but he could have sworn that his keen hearing caught the sound of someone crying during the night.


	15. It's Relative

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorry this update took so long. You wouldn't believe how busy I've been. End-of-course tests, advanced placement test, projects that the teachers seem to think are fun to dump on us right before school lets out. Sorry. But it's here now, right? I think you'll like these next two as a follow-up to the conflict in the last one. But that's just a subplot. This story is far from over…

Thanks to my reviewers: **RavenSis **(yes, I am indeed doing pairs), **Agent of the Divine One**, and **acosta perez jose ramiro**. Special thanks to **Broken Sword of the Morning**, who helped me fix a few inconsistencies. Muchas gracias! Here's the chapter!

Chapter 15:

It's Relative

Dick's face was pale and drawn when he came down for breakfast the next morning. He didn't look as though he'd gotten much sleep that night.

"Hey, you okay, man?" Victor asked him, tentatively laying a hand on his shoulder as Dick fished out some bread from the pantry and started to make toast.

"Leave me alone," the boy snapped, jerking his shoulder away and glaring at the toaster. Victor opened his mouth to say something testy, but Raven grabbed a handful of his shirt and dragged him into the living room.

"Hey, watch it, you're going to stretch it!"

"Leave him alone today, Cyborg. Dick's upset."

"Naw, I hadn't noticed," he replied sarcastically. "What's he so pissed about anyway?" Raven gaped at him.

"You really don't have any brains at all, have you?" she asked, arching an eyebrow. "Maybe it isn't as obvious to you, but I can see right through that little mask he puts on. All that outward anger is inward hurt. He's upset about Ashley being his cousin, the fact that she's part of a family that rejected him, and that she made him relive all the pain he went through when his parents died. Trust me, messing with him would be a very bad idea."

Victor was annoyed, but he couldn't help but look at Raven admiringly. "How do you know all that?"

"I've been inside his mind, remember?" she asked. "Ever since that episode with the Slade hallucinations, I've been able to pick up on Robin's emotions more acutely. Whatever he feels, I get a shadow of it. And right now he's feeling a lot." Victor studied her face. Raven's amethyst eyes were slightly red and there were dark circles underneath. Dick hadn't been the only one who'd been unable to sleep that night.

"Okay, I'll leave off. I'm going to tell BB and Star to leave him alone as well."

"Good idea. I can only imagine what damage they could do… or what Robin could do."

Someone cleared their throat behind them. Turning, Raven and Cyborg saw Dick standing there.

"Come on," he said, his voice flat. "We're going to be late."

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Dick's mood did not improve as they walked to the bus stop. He ignored Gar's jocular disposition and all of Kori's attempts to cheer him up. Raven and Victor left him alone and tried to divert Gar and Kori's attention to them. Dick just stared ahead silently.

He sat alone on the bus that day. Ashley, apparently, was in just as bad a mood as he was, and in no hurry to forgive him. Rather than stick with the seating chart on the bus, she sat next to Logan, refusing to even acknowledge Dick's existence. Dick didn't care; at the moment, he hated her with every cell in his body.

The feud between Dick and Ashley had some unfortunate consequences for everyone. Neither Ashley nor Logan would talk to any of the Titans all day. Apparently Logan was siding with Ashley on this one, but the Titans were sticking by Dick. The two groups sat apart during lunch.

"Where are Ashley and Logan?" Joey asked, plopping down at their usual table.

"Over on the other side of the cafeteria," Victor told him, jerking his head in their direction. Ashley and Logan were sitting with the twins, their backs to the Titans. Stephen was sitting at their table too, reading a book.

"Why are they over there?"

"We had a fight," replied Dick quietly, glaring in their direction. He'd kill Ashley if she turned Stephen against him too.

"About what?"

Dick was sorely tempted to tell Joey to shut up and leave him alone, but he didn't have the heart. It would be like kicking a puppy.

"Don't worry about it, Joe," was all he told him.

Kori absolutely refused to talk to Logan during Band, and Logan made no attempts to be friendly. There was simmering resentment pouring from both Ashley and Raven all through fourth period. As a result, several things exploded, making it very hard for the students to concentrate on the lines they were supposed to be learning.

Joey was on the lookout for Ashley and Logan all during Gym. Ashley could quite clearly be seen on the soccer field, kicking the crap out of the ball and being especially merciless to the members of the other team. Dick scanned the field for Logan just because he was bored. He didn't see him, but Dick thought he saw a stray shadow lurking beneath a tree on the edge of the field.

Suddenly the group stopped walking. There was a commotion at one end of the field. Bradley and his group had ganged up on another kid…. And not just any kid, a _mentally retarded_ kid. Dick's blood was boiling, and he began to stride quickly toward them. Vic and Raven, seeing the danger immediately, grabbed hold of the back of his shirt.

"Let go!" he growled. "Let me at him; I don't need my staff, I'm going to kill him with my bare hands…."

"Dick, _no!"_ said Raven through clenched teeth. "You're going to get us caught!" Vic quickly solved the problem by grabbing Dick in a tight bear hug, and though Dick kicked and struggled he couldn't get away.

"Okay, fine! I'll leave off." Vic put him down and he stood with his arms crossed, glaring at the group of boys on the other side of the field. Joey was looking at them with his mouth wide open and his eyes big. It was a classic "WTF?" look. Seeing it on the little redhead caused Kori and Gar to laugh.

"Trust us," Gar grinned. "You don't want to know." Joey closed his mouth and nodded. Then everyone looked at the group again, startled, because suddenly it had erupted into chaos.

"What the hell?" asked Vic, watching as some unseen force caused Bradley to jump about a foot in the air with a wild yell, clutching his rear end. One of the other bullies found himself standing in his boxers, his pants gathered around his knees. Two more had their heads banged together, and the group scattered, unsure of what was going on but not too keen on finding out. A shadow darted from the scene of the crime to the woods.

A clear peal of laughter rocked the soccer field. Ashley had doubled up, she was laughing so hard. Gradually, the rest of her bewildered team began to snigger and point in the direction the bullies had fled.

"Was that who I believe it was?" Kori asked hesitantly.

"Yes," said Dick with satisfaction as he watched Logan walk out of the trees.

Joey, surprisingly, didn't look as confused as he should have.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Gar was sulking like a whipped dog by the time they got into Biology. Ashley hadn't talked to him all day, and he was a little angry with Dick for turning the two teams against each other. However, he said nothing to his friend. Dick's face looked like Raven's when she was in a bad mood, but Gar knew better. He had an animal's nose, and sorrow was a strong scent.

"What's up with you?" Stephen asked Dick halfway during History. Tatum was busy yelling at the very unfortunate Billy Crandall at the front of the class, leaving everyone else free to talk if they were willing to risk it. Dick put his pencil down on top of the notes he'd been taking about the French Revolution and turned around.

"What makes you think something's up?"

"Please, Dick. I'm crippled, not stupid." Dick winced a little at Stephen's bluntness. "You and Logan haven't said a word to each other all period. You haven't cracked a smile this whole time. Normally you've given two or three of them by now." Dick couldn't help it; the corners of his mouth tipped up a little bit. "There's one, but that's not like the ones you usually do." Stephen stretched his arms; they were cramped from sitting at his desk. "So what's wrong?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"People normally don't want to do what's best for themselves."

Dick had learned by now that though Stephen was disabled, he was wise beyond his years. It just surprised him every time he heard his friend spout out something philosophical. If anyone could help him with his problem, it was Stephen.

"Well, um…" Dick rubbed the back of his neck, uncertain of how to tell Stephen about it without giving them all away. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Logan had stopped writing, his pencil still poised over the paper, watching Dick warily.

At this point, he hated Ashley, and he hated Logan too. Just thinking about either of them made him want to kick something. He would have loved to tell Stephen all about it; Stephen could be trusted with this, no doubt about it. But it was not just Dick's secret to keep. It was Bruce Wayne's. It was both Ashley and Logan's, and all of their friends. Logan was giving Dick a frightened, almost _pleading _look. Dick gave his head a shake; no, he couldn't do it.

"Never mind, Stephen. Everything's okay."

Logan relaxed visibly and went back to his notes.

By the end of the day, Dick really didn't want to talk to anyone. For once, the students had been released a little early, giving them some extra socializing time before the buses left.

"Well, I guess I'll see y'all later," said Victor as they walked out to the bus lane.

"Where are you going?" Dick asked him.

"Football tryouts!" Vic waved to them as he walked toward the locker rooms.

"I hope he makes it," said Gar wistfully. "It's all he's been talking about for the last three days."

"Are you going to try out for any sports?" inquired Kori.

"I don't know yet. Are you?"

"I have seen the cheerleaders, and though I think I would like to participate in their activities, I do not think the captain of the team and I would get along very well."

"Who is it?" asked Gar with a grin.

"Kitten," Kori sniffed. Gar laughed.

They walked to the buses, but paused outside.

"I don't want to go in," said Raven. "One more day with Tiffany and Stephanie and there'll be casualties."

For the first time that day, Dick laughed; he didn't doubt it for a second. "Hah, look at that, I got a giggle," said Raven triumphantly. "And you say I'm not funny." She poked Gar in between the shoulder blades. Gar stuck his tongue out.

"I also have no desire to sit with Johnny and Tyler," Kori put in.

"Don't worry," Dick told them. "Starting next week, we'll be able to sit wherever we want to."

"Really?" The others looked at him curiously. "Who told you that?"

"Ashley," he said shortly. That ended the conversation.

Robin was working out in the gym downstairs. Strenuous exercise was the best outlet for his emotions. Starfire floated down there to check on him.

"Robin?" she asked curiously.

"Over here, Star." Starfire floated over to see him resting on a bench, drinking a Gatorade.

"It is time for the consumption of dinner," she told him, sitting down beside him. "Will you not come and join us? Cyborg has returned home, and he has much to tell about the trying-out of football."

Robin stared at the wall. The offer was tempting, it really was—but he didn't want to ruin the evening for everyone else with his melancholy attitude. He'd noticed that Gar had begun to avoid talking to him, and Starfire was constantly worrying about him.

"No thanks, Starfire. I'll grab some dinner before I go to bed, okay?" Starfire was quiet for a moment.

"Robin, you should not be so angry at Livewire," she said softly. Robin jumped; it always startled him when Starfire correctly guessed at what he was thinking. "It is not her fault, after all. She is not the head of the family; she has no say in the important decisions."

"She could have at least _tried _to argue on my behalf," Robin muttered. "I don't think she ever wanted a cousin."

"Did you ask her?" Robin jumped again; he hadn't. He'd jumped to conclusions and started shouting at her. _Dang it, Starfire, now you've made me feel bad._

"Well, what am I supposed to do about it now?" he asked.

"I believe you should apologize to her," Starfire shrugged.

"Apologize?" he exclaimed incredulously. "Why? She started it! Why should I apologize to her? Besides, she hates me now. I doubt she'll let me get within ten feet of her before she electrocutes me."

"I do not think she is that angry at you," said Starfire. "She is hiding her sadness behind anger, like you."

"It scares me how you know how my mind works." Starfire giggled.

"I am merely saying that this would be the best course of action. I do not think it was right for her to drag up your parents' deaths, but then I do not think it was right for you to attack her. Justifiable, but not right," she added quickly as Robin opened his mouth to protest. "Believe me, Robin, apologizing would be the wisest thing to do now. If you do not do it soon, you may never get the chance. You and Ashley may grow up hating each other, and believe me, it is not very pleasant to hate your family." With that, Starfire glided off the bench and flew to the stairway.

Robin sat numbly on the bench. He'd forgotten all about the feud between Star and her sister, Blackfire. If he were to go to anybody about family advice, it should have been her. And although he hated to admit it, she was right.

And then he replayed their argument in his mind, and how much Livewire's words had stung. The old anger rushed through him again, and he proceeded to attack the punching bag.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Robin worked out a lot that weekend. In fact, he was downstairs in the gym when the alarm went off on Sunday. Of course, he was still the first one at the computer consol when the others came in for their mission.

"Who is it this time?" asked Cyborg.

"The HIVE," Robin replied. "I just got a lock on their coordinates."

"Titans, go?" prompted Beastboy. Robin nodded, and they ran out of the Tower.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

The HIVE students had heard about Phantom and Livewire, but they hadn't expected to see them at the Pavilions, the outdoor mall in Jump City. But they weren't too worried, and by the time the Titans arrived in the T-Car, the two teams had been engaged in combat for several minutes.

Livewire was in the air, trying to outmaneuver Gizmo as he flew behind her, while dodging Jinx's bolts of magic and trying to shoot at the same time. Phantom was trying his hardest to beat back Mammoth, but the size difference between them was so great that Phantom had resorted to phasing through the giant anytime Mammoth came near him. Seemore and Private HIVE were busy raiding the stores.

"Look who decided to crash the party!" Gizmo sang out as he dove sharply over their heads.

"Party's over," Robin snarled, and they leapt into battle.

Beastboy wanted to go help Ashley, but the way she was flying made it impossible to keep up. So, while the others fought with the four remaining HIVE members, the green changeling rushed to Phantom's aid.

Phantom was still having real trouble getting far enough away from Mammoth to go tangible and start fighting. He dodged from side to side, wincing visibly as Mammoth's fists sailed through his head. The constant phasing was really taking it out of him.

"Go through all you like, ghost-boy," Mammoth grinned, "but sooner or later Mammoth's going to make you extinct!"

_Oh, jeez, where have I heard that before?_ wondered Beastboy. Obviously Phantom thought the line was as corny as Beastboy did, because his frustrated retort was, "_Mammoth _needs to stop referring to himself in the third person!"

Phantom's smart mouth gave Beastboy the distraction he needed. He charged as a rhino and sent Mammoth flying. Phantom became solid with a look of relief.

"Need a hand?" asked Beastboy quirkily. "Or eight?" He morphed into a squid and waved his tentacles.

"No," Phantom replied, glaring darkly at Mammoth, who was up on his feet and out for blood, "but a big mouth and a hell of a lot of teeth ought to help."

"One T-Rex surprise, coming up!"

When Mammoth finally got himself coordinated again, he found himself staring at the huge, dripping fangs of a Tyrannosaurus Rex. Like the first time he'd seen it, Mammoth screamed like a little girl and bolted. Phantom, perched high on Beastboy's neck, began to laugh.

"Hi-ho, Silver!" he cried, digging his knees into the changeling's massive neck. The dinosaur swung his huge head around and tried to look at him, but being a T-rex he couldn't quite manage it.

"_No_, Phantom," said Livewire, shooting past him with Gizmo gliding along behind her like a bat. "Never again!"

"What?" asked Phantom, blushing a little. "It was funny for a second."

"No it wasn't!" shouted everyone, both hero and supervillain, who had happened to hear him say it.

"Well, fine then!" he snapped, sliding down Beastboy's back and tackling Seemore from behind.

Livewire dipped and dived and darted, but she couldn't get away from Gizmo. To make things worse, now the little midget was _shooting _at her.

"Oh, this is stupid!" she shouted into the air as she whizzed narrowly between the two feuding figures of Robin and Private HIVE. Gizmo just flew over them.

"Got that right, you scrumbuffin' gunk-eater!" Gizmo crowed, firing a volley of laser blasts. Livewire began to fly in a bizarre pattern, one so hectic that Gizmo had to stop shooting just to keep up. Livewire wove between the support beams, turning so sharply that Gizmo had to go almost vertical to keep from crashing into the pillars. "Hold still already!" Gizmo shouted at her, trying to get Livewire centered in his crosshairs.

"Aw, am I going too fast for the widdle boy?" Livewire crooned, turning quickly and throwing a lightning bolt at him. It missed him by a hair. "Would he like for me to slow down?"

The baby-talk made Gizmo lose it. Yelling with fury, he opened fire on Livewire, who swerved aside and dove towards the ground. It was a sort of mad game of follow-the-leader as she shot between the fighting figures of the Titans and the HIVE, with Gizmo just behind her.

Raven and Jinx had been fighting earlier, but now it had turned into a sort of wrestling match with magic. Together they had blasted apart most of Abercrombie and Fitch, and Starfire had joined the fray. Robin and Private HIVE were still decking it out, and Cyborg and Beastboy had teamed up against Mammoth. Which left poor Phantom with Seemore.

Phantom had gone invisible and had tried fighting like that, but it hadn't worked. Seemore just laughed and blocked every invisible punch Phantom threw at him.

"Not gonna work, Spooky!" he smirked. "My eye can see right through that!"

There was a disembodied swear and Phantom flickered back into view.

"Does anybody want to switch bad guys?" he yelled as Seemore threw a punch at his head.

"No, we're good!" Cyborg shouted, tearing one of the support beams from the wall and hitting Mammoth with it full force. The blow knocked the huge teenager into Private HIVE, who had just pinned Robin to the floor. In all actuality, Cyborg did him a favor—getting hit with a three hundred pound mass of muscle was way better than what Robin had been about to do to him.

"BOO-YAH!" Cyborg yelled triumphantly as Robin sprang to his feet. The sudden yell caused Seemore to turn around, and Phantom kicked him hard in the gut, sending to his knees. Phantom was about to pick the other boy up by his lapels when suddenly he was forced to jump back as Livewire and Gizmo shot between them.

"Come on, squirt, you can go faster than that!" Livewire teased, veering sharply to the left. Gizmo nearly fell out of the air as he tried to turn as quickly as she had. His fury at Livewire's taunting was causing him to fly less skillfully, something Livewire had noticed. Her plan could work.

"Catch me if you can!" she called, and pulled a U-turn toward the fountain in the courtyard of the Pavilions. Gizmo followed in hot pursuit.

Livewire pulled as much electricity as she dared from the air around her and darted low between the structure of the fountain and the spout of water it was giving off. Timing herself perfectly, she drove a lightning bolt into the pool beneath her and veered sharply up toward the sky, then turned to watch the fun.

Gizmo had tried to copy her flight pattern, but he hadn't quite managed it. The tip of his metal wing clipped the water that was spouting off the fountain. The charge Livewire had shot into the water hit him full force, and he yelled in pain before the electricity ebbed and dropped him, still smarting painfully, into the pool of the fountain. Livewire pointed and laughed delightedly.

Phantom, who had Seemore by the collar, looked up to see what his teammate was laughing at. Seemore took advantage of the moment and used his eye to blast him in the chest. Luckily Phantom had seen what Seemore was doing just in time and phased through the blast, but the laser did quite a number on his lungs. Phantom hit the floor, gasping painfully. The laser Seemore had fired, rather than hitting Phantom, drove into the support beam that was holding up the ceiling, under which Raven and Starfire were hurling starbolts and anything Raven could get her magic on at Jinx. The ceiling collapsed, and both girls were buried beneath the rubble.

"Star! Raven!" Beastboy and Cyborg leapt to their aid, but were instantly blocked by Private HIVE. Mammoth was fighting Robin, and getting the crap kicked out of him.

Jinx saw the danger to her teammate. Her eyes glowing bright pink, she shot a bolt of magic at a nearby car and hurled it toward the fighting teenagers.

"Mammoth, move!" she shouted. Both Mammoth and Robin looked to see what she was talking about. Mammoth caught the gist first. He turned and punched Robin in the ribs, knocking the boy's breath out and flinging him against the wall before jumping out of the way. Robin looked up in time to see the car hurtling toward him and curled into a ball. He knew that with no Phantom to phase him through, there was no possible way that he could escape this time.

Suddenly the car halted in midair, surrounded by a crackling yellow aura. Robin stared wide-eyed at it before it turned and sailed back toward Mammoth and Jinx, hitting them full force and pinning them beneath it. Robin glanced up to see Livewire, grinning from ear to ear, fly down beside him.

"Saved your life!" she smirked, looking down at him. Robin scowled at her, but then he saw a movement behind her back. Gathering his legs beneath him, Robin hurled himself at Livewire and tackled her to the ground just as a red laser blast scorched the air above them, exactly where Livewire had just been standing.

"What was that for?" Livewire yelled indignantly, punching Robin in his already sore ribs. He was going to have some very interesting bruises there tomorrow. Scowling, he turned around and pointed to the wall behind them, saying "Saved yours." A hole had melted into the wall at about the height of Livewire's head. Seeing that her head had nearly been vaporized off her shoulders, Livewire gulped. "Wow," she said weakly. "That looks like it would have hurt."

"No, you think?" Robin snapped, picking himself up and hurling a freezer disk at Seemore. It hit the ground at his feet, freezing him to the spot and creeping up his body until he was totally encased in ice.

The fight was over. Gizmo was sitting, soaking wet and still giving off electrostatic discharge, in the fountain, mumbling all manner of nasty insults that made little to no sense. Mammoth and Jinx were pinned beneath the car, very dazed from the force of the impact. Seemore was, of course, frozen to the ground. Private HIVE had a metal pole wrapped around his body and he was sitting sulkily on the ground, glowering as Cyborg and Beastboy helped Raven and Starfire out of the pile of rubble. Neither of the girls was hurt; Raven had managed to put a shield up just in time. In fact, the person who had gotten the worst from the fight was probably Phantom, who was still grimacing in pain every time he took a breath.

"Are you okay?" Livewire asked anxiously, looking at his pale and sweaty face.

"Well, I'm not dying, so I guess that qualifies," said Phantom sourly. "Dang, I should have just taken it."

"Nuh-uh," said Beastboy, shaking his head. "Look what that laser did to the wall." He pointed to the still smoking hole that Robin and Livewire had narrowly avoided. Phantom, if possible, went paler.

"Jeez," he gasped. "No wonder it hurt so badly when it went through. That thing could have killed me."

"Yeah…" Livewire turned a little red and looked determinedly away from Robin, who was still trying not to look at Mammoth and Jinx pinned under the car that had been meant for him.

"Let's tie these guys up and get home," said Cyborg. "Phantom, are you going to be able to make it? We could give you a lift." Everyone except Robin and Livewire nodded. This fight was between the cousins; there was no reason that they couldn't help an injured friend get home.

"That'd be great," Phantom replied, wincing as he stood up straight. He gave them a reassuring smile, as if to make it very clear that even though he was extremely sore he was okay overall.

"Cyborg, you and the others get Phantom home," Robin ordered. "I'll take care of these clowns."

"I'll fly home myself," said Livewire, glancing sideways at Robin. Cyborg nodded, and he, Beastboy and Starfire headed off toward the T-Car. Raven put Phantom's arm over her shoulder and helped him hobble toward the car. As they drove off, Robin pulled a coil of rope out of his utility belt and began to tie up Gizmo.

"Scrumbuffin' goatchewer!" he growled, giving off another spark.

"Does he speak English at all?" asked a voice. Robin turned; Livewire was hovering anxiously a few inches off the ground, peering over his shoulder.

"Thought you were flying home," Robin said roughly, tightening Gizmo's ropes.

"I'm sure not walking," came the saucy reply. Robin finished binding Gizmo and left the miniature supergenius to shiver in the fountain. Seemore and Private HIVE wouldn't need binding—Private HIVE wasn't getting out of that pole anytime soon, and poor Seemore was going to have to be chipped off the floor and carried away, seeing as he was frozen solid. That left Mammoth and Jinx, who were still pinned beneath the car. Robin hesitated; he would not be able to lift the car off of them on his own.

"Since you're still here, do you mind moving this?" he asked gruffly, still not looking at Livewire. Without a reply, Livewire stretched out her hand. A glowing yellow aura surrounded the car, and it lifted gently off of the two semi-conscious villains.

"Thanks," Robin muttered, tying them both. "And, um… thanks, you know, for…" He trailed off, but he glanced meaningfully at the vehicle.

"Oh," said Livewire. "No problem."

"You didn't have to, you know."

"Sure I did. I wasn't about to let some second-rate supervillain hit you with a car," she grinned, nudging Jinx with her shoe. Then she went a little pink. "And thanks to you too, I guess."

"Well, I wasn't about to let some second-rate supervillain melt your head off," Robin replied, checking Mammoth's ropes again.

"I suppose compassion runs in the family?" Livewire suggested meekly. Robin gave her a stony glare.

"Don't push it," he said. Livewire stiffened. Gizmo was sitting in the fountain with his mouth wide open.

"Hey Bird Boy!" he called. "Are you saying that this pit-sniffin' toejammer is _related_ to you?" Livewire went a livid red color, and she turned to glare at Gizmo.

"Oh, shut up before I put you in a corner," she snapped.

Robin just barely suppressed a mirthful snort. Livewire heard him choking back his laughter, and she didn't appreciate it.

"Cripes. I'm out of here; I have to check on Phantom." She lifted into the air. "See you, Bird Boy."

"See you, pit-sniffin' toejammer," he replied, fighting back the mad desire to burst out laughing. Livewire rolled her eyes and sighed loudly before flying off, the bright lightning bolt on her torso contrasting strangely with the deepening sky. Then she was gone.

Robin watched her go. He didn't feel very much like laughing now. It had just occurred to him that this would have been a good time to apologize. He'd been about to, too, but then Livewire had slipped in the family remark. Still, he'd been half-hoping she might apologize first. Come to think of it, he really wasn't all that mad at her. Robin didn't really feel angry at all at the moment. He did, however, feel rather stupid. Had he sunk so low as to call her a _pit-sniffin' toejammer?_

"You never answered my question," said Gizmo sulkily.

Robin watched silently as the flashing lights on the top of the police cars approached. Then he grinned.

"Shut up or I'll put you in a corner."


	16. Family Ties

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the

show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Chapter 16:

FAMILY TIES

Dick was considerably perkier on Monday than he had been the week before. The other Titans noticed this and were relieved—they'd missed the old Robin in his absence. Dick and Ashley still refused to even look at each other—but now it was more out of embarrassment than anything else. Since the students were now allowed to sit wherever they wanted, the Titans grouped together near the back of the bus, while Ashley and Logan talked only a few seats away.

No words were said between either team during first period, although nods and smiles were exchanged.

As they sat in Advanced Language Arts, Mr. Killingsworth handed back the essays that they had done on _The Tempest, _commenting as he did so.

"You made some interesting points, Miss Jones…. Colin, Cole, yours were good, but next time try not to pick the _same exact topic…._ Raven, extremely well written, powerful arguments…. Mr. Stone, it was sketchy, but I enjoyed your paper…." He went around the room and paused at Dick, a smile quivering at his mouth.

"I found yours extremely interesting, Mr. Grayson," he chuckled. Mr. Killingsworth read an excerpt from the beginning paragraph aloud: _ "The statement made at the end of the book as to the whole story being the dream of some greater being is correct, seeing as the play was written by William Shakespeare, who obviously must have "dreamed" it up."_ He laughed loudly. _"Very _good, Dick! This is the first year I've had someone do that. And not just one person, _two_. Miss Thompson, come get your paper."

Ashley blushed and came to retrieve it, her eyes on the floor. Mr. Killingsworth was still talking: "It blows my mind how the two of you came up with the same argument, an extremely quick-witted observation…."

"Guess it runs in the family," said Dick, just barely loud enough for Ashley to hear. She glanced at him and gave him a shy, grateful smile, which he returned broadly.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Dick emerged from the lunch line with a tray of unidentified substance. After paying for his food, he stood and waited for the others to get out. He wondered if Ashley and Logan would sit with them today. Maybe they were still a little steamed. Dick shuffled impatiently; this stupid fight had to end. He didn't think he could stand it much longer. Especially not after yesterday. After all, Ashley and Logan were practically part of the team now.

A movement to his right caught his eye. Ashley was making her way hesitantly toward him, flitting nervously among the crowds.

_Here goes nothing,_ he thought with a deep breath, and strode over to her. She met him halfway.

"Dick—"

"Ash—"

And suddenly they were both talking; rather quickly, too.

"I should've just told you instead of surprising you like that—"

"—Attacked you without thinking, and being a _total_ jerk—"

"I didn't know it would affect you that way, and I shouldn't have dragged up your parents—"

"--I overreacted, I should've just listened—"

"I'm sorry." Dick blinked; they'd both said it at the same time. Seeing the look of surprise on the other's face, they began to laugh.

"Really?" asked Ashley, panting with the speed at which she'd been talking.

"_Really,"_ Dick replied earnestly. She grinned widely at him.

"So…. Friends?" Ashley held out her hand. Dick shook his head.

"Family," he told her. They shook hands.

Ashley came and sat with him. The others were already at the table, thinking about eating but not really sure if it was worth the risk (except for Kori and Joey, who were digging in with much gusto). They looked up as the cousins took their seats.

"Well alright!" grinned Vic. "You made up!"

"Took you long enough," Raven frowned.

"Glorious!" beamed Kori.

"Awesome!" Gar exclaimed, immediately taking a seat on Ashley's other side. Joey said nothing; he was too busy scarfing down his lunch. A few moments later, Logan emerged from the lunch line looking confused.

"Logan doesn't know yet, does he?" asked Raven, a thin smile tugging at her mouth. Ashley's blue eyes went wide, and she grinned sheepishly: "Oops." Everyone turned; poor Logan was standing in the middle of the cafeteria, looking around for Ashley, bewildered. A loud burst of laughter finally got his attention, and, grinning in an embarrassed sort of way, he joined them at the table.

Joey seemed to accept this reunion without question, and was as indifferent to the situation as though it had never happened. This struck the others as curious; normally Joey would be brimming with questions. However, they didn't press the matter, and just smiled and laughed as Joey chattered, walking backwards like he always did as they made their way around the field during gym.

For the first time in four or five days, Dick was perfectly happy. He was laughing at a joke Logan had told when suddenly another bout of laughter rang out from one end of the field. Hardly anyone had to look to tell who it was—Bradley and his friends had found another victim. They had once again formed a circle around a helpless student, hurling the ball at him. Dick felt his blood rise, like it normally did, but then it skyrocketed when he caught a glimpse of the kid in the middle.

It was Stephen.

The other boys had the dodge ball again and were rolling the ball at his crutches. Sometimes it bounced off, and other times it knocked Stephen over. He fell once more and couldn't get up. The other boys started laughing hysterically. Dick went beet red.

"Oh, that's it," he muttered, and strode forward, his fists clenched.

"Dick—"

"Damn it, Raven!" He turned to face his friend furiously. "You can't stand there and tell me that this doesn't burn you up too. I can't stand here and watch this any longer. And to make things worse, it's Stephen! What kind of friend would I be if I didn't help? I'm going over there and I'm going to kick that kid's sorry butt, and don't you _dare_ try to stop me!"

Raven cocked her eyebrows in an amused sort of way. "Stop you?" she asked. "No. I just wanted to tell you: don't kill him. He's just a stupid kid." Dick grinned rather nastily and turned again, calling out, "Hey, Bradley!"

"What?" The tall bully looked around.

At first, Bradley couldn't tell who had called him. The voice had been commanding, authoritive, and no one in their right mind spoke that way to Bradley unless they were about twice his size. What he _did_ see was a skinny little black-haired boy that was a full two heads shorter than Bradley, coming at him like an angry bull.

"What do you want, shrimp?" he asked with a sneer.

_Oh, I'm going to enjoy this,_ thought Dick. He pulled back his fist, letting all the anger, frustration, and despair he'd been through in the past few days channel into his wiry muscles. By the time he let fly, there was a lot of power behind that fist. Dick landed it straight on Bradley's nose, knocking him four feet away.

The surprise on Bradley's face was so classic that Dick almost laughed. Surely, _surely_, this little raven-haired midget hadn't knocked _him_ down. Any doubt Bradley had about it was dispelled when he felt something warm and salty on his lips and realized that his nose was bleeding. He put a hand up to stem the blood flow and began to whimper like a puppy dog. Dick glared at the other bullies in the group, daring them to take a step toward him, but they were all so amazed at what he'd just done to their leader that they didn't move.

Dick stared disgustedly at Bradley, who had just been reduced to a trembling, cowering ball on the ground. And to think, seconds before he'd seemed big and intimidating.

"If there's one thing I hate, it's a coward," Dick said loudly as his friends ran up behind him. "Someone who picks on other kids just because he's bigger or stronger. A coward knows he's a coward, so he acts tough so that other people won't figure it out. He puts down smaller and weaker kids because it makes him look bigger in front of his friends. Well, here's a message for you: that's going to stop. Now." Dick turned slowly, looking every bully in the eye until the boys looked away, quailing under the dark-haired youth's fierce gaze. Lots of kids had gathered now, amazed that someone had had the guts to take down Bradley. "If I _ever_ catch _anyone_ picking on someone smaller, or weaker, or younger than them in _this _school, you'll get a lot more than a bloody nose. If you can't pick on someone your own size, you're going to have to answer to me."

"No," said a voice behind him. Ashley took a step forward and stood at Dick's side.

"You'll have to answer to _us_," growled Victor, cracking his knuckles.

"_All_ of us," added Logan, glaring at the assembled crowd.

The eight of them stood there side by side: Victor towering over the others like a menacing boulder; Gar and Joey flanking him, glaring down at Bradley; Kori and Raven, eyes flashing fiercely, daring any of the bullies to make an objection; Ashley and Logan on either side of the Titans' leader; and Dick, his arms folded over his small chest, looking so fierce that no sane person would have dared disagree with him. Standing there with his friends at his sides, Dick felt like he was invincible.

Whimpering like puppies, the bullies nodded earnestly, then turned tail and bolted. Bradley, seeing that his gang had deserted him, scrambled to his feet and ran after them, still snuffling, still dripping blood onto the grass.

The crowd of students still stood in silence, staring at the eight teens that had dared to defy the natural order of things. Dick ignored them, and instead walked forward and helped Stephen to his feet.

"You okay?" he asked.

"_Way _better than okay," Stephen grinned. "But then, seeing Bradley get his butt kicked would make anybody's day better."

Someone let out a whoop of agreement, and suddenly the whole crowd surged forward, clapping and shouting for Dick, Kori, Gar, Raven, Victor, Ashley, Logan, and Joey. All of the sudden the eight of them found themselves surrounded by admiring classmates, thumping them on the back, shaking their hands, and telling them that they were either unbelievingly brave or incredibly stupid.

"Good lord," said Logan, looking around innocently. "Anyone would think we were the Teen Titans."

The others couldn't help it. They laughed.

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A light breeze caused Robin's cape to flutter out behind him as he stood on the rooftop. The city was always so beautiful at night, with a thousand lights shimmering on the buildings, and the wavering reflections of the car headlamps on the bridge in the water. The sun had only just faded over the horizon, and the light it left still stained the darkening sky. Robin sat down on the roof and allowed his legs to swing freely over the edge, trying to be patient; not a trait he was known for.

Ashley had cornered him before everyone had departed to go home and told him to meet her here at eight o'clock. Now here it was eight-ten, and Robin was getting annoyed.

There was a soft crackling sound accompanied by the clunk of boots on the granite.

"Sorry," came Livewire's voice. "My mom wouldn't let me out of the house—she thinks I'm at Logan's."

"'S okay," Robin replied as she sat down beside him. "So, what's up?"

Livewire was quiet for a little while. Then: "I really am sorry, you know."

"Ashley, it's okay. Can't we just forget it ever happened?"

_"No,_ we can't. I feel really bad about this." Livewire frowned as she stared at the city below her. "I shouldn't have dragged up your parents."

"Yeah, well, I shouldn't have flown off the handle at you," Robin replied. Something had been weighing on his chest for quite some time, and now seemed like a pretty good time to get it off. "It's just that I felt… I dunno, like I'd just been left entirely alone in the world. I mean, when I was sent to the orphanage, I stayed mostly to myself because I was still in shock. None of the other kids would talk to me. I didn't think I had any family, and then I heard the head of the orphanage talking with a social worker, saying how my mother's own sister didn't want to take me in. I didn't know that they had always fought; I just thought that there was something about me that no one seemed to like." Robin paused, unsure of what to say next. "And then I got adopted by Bruce Wayne…. I'm pretty sure you've figured out that part of the story?" Ashley smiled in an embarrassed sort of way. "Yes, well, after a while I felt like I had a family again. But I never forgot…" He trailed off. They sat in silence for a little while.

"We looked for you," Ashley said quietly. "After about a year, Mom felt so bad about it that we did look for you. We called the orphanage and tried to take you back, but you were already with Bruce, and they didn't want to rip you away from your new home when you had only just gotten settled. So we left you alone." She looked away, training her blue eyes on the lights of Titans' Tower. "I guess we should have tried harder."

"No," Robin said immediately. "Things work out for a reason." Robin didn't say this out loud, but privately he was very glad Ashley hadn't found him before now. If her family had adopted him, he never would have met Bruce, never would have become Robin…and the Titans wouldn't be here today. "Plus, we'd have had to _live _with each other, and we butt heads enough as it is."

"I heard that!" she replied with a sigh. They sat for a little while. Then Robin asked, "What's a Christmas like?"

Livewire looked so surprised that she nearly fell off the roof. "I mean a real Christmas," Robin went on, "with your parents and your brother and your whole family."

"You mean you don't know?" Livewire asked incredulously. Robin shook his head.

"When I was with my parents, we were on the road a lot of the time. Christmases were just us and the rest of the circus, no family or anything. Don't get me wrong," he added quickly, "I loved every minute of it, it's just… I always wondered what it was like. Especially after they died…" There was a definite note of sadness in his voice when he broke off. Ashley watched sympathetically.

"You really miss them, don't you?" she asked. Robin just nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

"It's kind of funny," he said after a moment. "You know that old saying, that time can heal everything?" Livewire nodded earnestly. "Well, it's a lie." Robin wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, warning away even the thought of crying. "Time can't heal these kinds of things. Time just makes it easier to deal with the pain. And after a while, you get new people in your life… they never fill that hole, but they sort of build around it, so that it doesn't hurt so badly anymore. But the hole is still there, and sometimes… it just starts hurting again."

"I know what you mean," Livewire said sadly. "My dad died a few years ago… I was eight." She looked up at Robin and gave a sort of half-smile. "Weird, isn't it? We both lost family members in the same year."

"I'm sorry," said Robin, feeling terrible for accusing her of not knowing the pain of losing a loved one during their fight.

"Yeah… anyway, we can do something about the Christmas, can't we? You can come over for dinner and open presents and everything. I don't think Mom'll mind too much; I mean, Matt's got friends coming over in dozens." They had already decided that Mrs. Thompson was not allowed to know that Ashley and Dick were cousins; she'd figure everything out.

"I don't know yet," Robin replied, smiling at her thankfully. "Cyborg's grandmother invited us over last year, that was kind of nice. And now that the Titans know Bruce's secret, he says we can spend Christmas at Wayne Manor."

"That sounds like fun. Well, I'll just have to drag you all over for Thanksgiving, then." Livewire gave him one of those crafty smiles. "This is great, having a cousin. Now that we're together, evil had better watch out!" She laughed, then cupped her hands over her mouth and shouted, "Did you hear that, world? EVIL BEWARE!" Dick started to laugh too. "Go on, try it, it's fun!"

Unable to believe he was actually doing it, Robin didn't even bother cupping his hands over his mouth and instead threw back his head and bellowed "EVIL BEWARE!" his clear voice ringing over the rooftops. He shook his head and grinned. "I can't believe you got me to do that."

"Ah, you're too uptight," Livewire grinned, digging him playfully in the ribs with her elbow. "You should hang around me more often; I'll teach you to have fun. Oh, and speaking of uptight…" Now she looked very serious. "Your hair. Don't comb it so straight tomorrow, it drives me insane. Ruffle it up in the front a little." Robin arched his eyebrows. "Don't look at me like that, I do it to everyone. You should have seen me when Logan got his hair cut, I flipped out on him. All his hobbit-curls were _gone!" _

"Are you sure I'm related to you? Kidding, kidding!" he added hastily when Livewire lit a few sparks on her fingers and shocked him.

"Yeah, you'd better be," she grinned. "Little brat."

"Love you too, Ashley."


	17. Attack on the Home Front

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, obviously, but I DO own Phantom, Livewire, the rest of the Six, Joey, Professor Grimm, Python and Icharus and all the other characters you don't see on the

show, so—ahem—MINEMINEMINEMINEMINE.

Um… if I even _tried _to apologize for the horrendous delay in updates, I get the feeling that the general response would be a hailstorm of rotten vegetables. Nevertheless, I really am sorry about this. I've really been wrestling with the idea that I may have to give it up. I've put off working on it because I hit a plot snag, and my other project is demanding my full attention. But I AM trying to finish it, and even if I do drop it, you guys are guaranteed a story up through Halloween and Thanksgiving at least.

Anyways, thanks for everyone who reviewed. It really means a lot, especially when you guys take the time to point out my mistakes and inconsistencies to I can improve. And so, shoutouts to **elecktrum** (go read her stuff, she's amazing), **Agent of the Divine One** (your review made me giggle), **Broken Sword of the Morning** (you've caught me—I'm a shameless Rowling stealer, but I'm trying to get better!), **acosta perez jose ramiro**, and **RavenSis** (I hope this satisfies your desire for the "other" characters). You guys ROCK. I hope this chapter is up to scratch!

Chapter 17:

Attack On The Home Front

The days went on, and the seasons began to turn. The air turned brisk and cool and the sky took on a sharper tone of blue. Light jackets were brought out and worn unzipped as the Titans walked to the bus stop in the morning. The leaves on the trees in the park went from green to the fiercely bright colors of autumn, and they crackled underfoot when the wind teased them from the branches and swept them through the streets.

Through fights and endless school days, the Titans and their new friends grew closer. As it turned out, Dick and Logan got along quite well, and they would spend hours debating battle tactics. Dick wasn't the only one with whom Logan got along well with; he and Raven could often be seen talking together quietly. Logan could also be as goofy as Gar sometimes (which was quite a wonder as to how Raven got on so well with him), and there was more than one incident where the others, Raven excluded, would be rolling on the floor with laughter. Ashley and Gar had hit it off at once—they teased each other and fought and bickered and laughed so much that they were soon as thick as thieves. Phantom and Livewire got along well with everyone.

One morning in mid-October found the Titans walking to the bus stop as usual. Kori had hold of Dick's forearm and was squealing excitedly whenever they passed a tree whose leaves had turned from green to fiery red, orange or yellow, and she kept dragging Dick over to look ("I _see_ them, Kori! They aren't that hard to miss!") Gar had his nose in the air, inhaling the scents of autumn that only his keen nose could pick up over the smells of the city. Victor was, once again, recounting the winning touchdown he'd made (yes, he made the football team) during the last game to Raven, who looked rather bored and was trying to entertain herself by watching Kori yank Dick from one side of the street to the other.

Ashley and Logan were waiting apart from the other kids as usual. They approached the Titans and were nearly bowled over as Kori dragged Dick over to yet another tree.

"Has she been doing that all morning?" asked Ashley, watching with raised eyebrows.

"Believe it or not, yes." Raven looked over at Logan and smiled. "Hey, you might want to put your jacket on over your shirt before Gar sees."

"Sees what?" asked Gar, coming up from behind her. Then he noticed Logan's shirt: it was black with three chickens watching another chicken on a rotisserie, with the words HORROR MOVIE written underneath. Victor seemed to think this was hilarious, but Gar blanched and shouted, "THAT'S EVIL!" Several of the other kids looked around in surprise and Gar quickly lowered his voice.

"What's wrong with it?" asked Logan, offended.

"_Dude! _What part of _Beastboy _don't you get? I've _been _a chicken, and that—" he stared in disgust at Logan's shirt, "—that's just not right!"

"Sorry, Gar, I forgot," Logan grinned.

"_Ouch_, Kori, _stop!"_ Dick finally managed to wrestle his arm free of Kori's grip; quite a feat, considering Kori's strength. Kori looked a little put out. "She does this every year," he explained to Logan and Ashley, who were giving Kori odd looks. "She likes the colors—they didn't have trees on her home planet."

"The colorful displays of Earth leaves are quite fascinating!" beamed Kori.

"Yeah, they are pretty," Ashley said, watching dreamily as a leaf floated by on the breeze. "We're going to have quite a colorful Halloween."

"Oh, that reminds me!" Gar exclaimed. "Are you guys going to the Halloween Carnival at the pier? We are—we wanted to know if you'd like to come."

"There's a Halloween carnival at the pier?" asked Logan.

"Yeah, they have one every year," said Victor. "Y'all should come, it's a blast. Almost everyone in the city is going to be there."

"I don't know… I think I'm going to have to take my brat trick-or-treating this year," Ashley sighed. "I'll try to convince him, though. Hey Vic, when's your next football game?"

"Friday. Why? Are you finally going to come?"

"Don't be like that. My mom's had to work late at the hospital for the past few weeks and I've had to baby-sit. Pays well, though." Ashley grinned. "But yeah, I want to come watch the Jaguars kick the crap out of the Eagles."

"Don't be so cocky, you'll jinx the winning streak!" Gar put in immediately.

"Come off it," said Dick impatiently. "They've beaten every other high school team in the county—I sincerely doubt that thinking they'll trounce the Eagles is going to jinx them."

"Yeah," laughed Victor, although he looked a little worried.

"BUS!" someone shouted, and everyone scrambled into line.

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By now, Gar and Joey had become very good friends; Joey considered Gar to be his best friend, with the other Titans, Ashley and Logan running closely behind. Gar had gotten past Joey's hyperactivity and Joey had gotten past Gar's unwillingness to answer certain questions. It was an unspoken agreement not to speak of either of their families. Gar understood his reasons, but he didn't understand Joey's at all.

"What about your sister?" Gar had asked week or two ago. "What grade is she in?" Joey had stared at him blankly.

"I don't have a sister," he'd said, his brow furrowed.

"Yes you do!" Gar exclaimed, surprised. "You told me on the first day that your sister told you—"

"Oh _that _sister!" Joey interrupted, looking slightly panicked. "Yeah, um… she's in the twelfth grade, she'll be graduating any time now…"

Gar, still confused, had dropped the subject.

Now they were sitting in Art class, making self-portraits with oil pastels. Or rather, Joey was making a self-portrait, and with much gusto, and Gar was sitting with his chin in his hand and his eyes half-closed. The Titans had been out late last night stopping a robbery, and he'd been up until three struggling through the Algebra homework that had been piled on him. Gar didn't understand it—Raven, Robin and Cyborg flew through the homework as though all the problems were as simple as two plus two. Even Starfire had a fairly easy time of it. So why was it that whenever he looked at a problem it made about as much sense as one of Cyborg's lengthy explanations of how the T-ship worked?

"Garfield, are you feeling all right?" Mrs. Rachel asked, concerned. You haven't even picked up your pastels."

"'M fine," Gar muttered sleepily, sitting up straight and rubbing his eyes. How come he could pull an all-nighter on the Gamestation and still have enough fuel to go in the morning than he could if he stayed up doing homework?

"Are you sure? You look very tired," she told him, placing a hand on his shoulder.

"I was up late working last night, is all," Gar explained. "I didn't even get started on my homework until eleven—"

"What?" Mrs. Rachel asked, startled. "Why not?"

_Oh, I had to go with my friends to stop a few bad guys from robbing a jewelry store, no big deal._ Gar debated with himself whether he wanted to keep their cover or see the teacher's face when he told her, but he decided on the former. "Um… I had a lot of chores to do…"

"Your parents gave you so many chores that you stayed up until _eleven_?" she asked, genuinely alarmed now. Joey was listening intently, gripping his pastel a little harder than he was intending to. "Gar, dear, does that happen often?"

"Not really, wh—?" Suddenly Gar got an idea of what Mrs. Rachel was hinting out. "Oh, no, ma'am, I think you've got the wrong idea. This was just a one-time thing. My parents don't abuse me or anything." Gar felt a pang of longing when he spoke of his parents, but he was used to it by now and didn't let it distract him. He kept his face open and honest as Mrs. Rachel relaxed.

"Oh, good," she sighed. "I'm sorry dear, you don't know how many children I've seen in these situations. Neglected, beaten… and the worst part is that the children believe it's all their fault, as though they deserve it… When really it's the fault of the parents…"

"SHUT UP!" someone screamed suddenly. Joey had jumped out of his chair, his freckles contrasting sharply with his now pale face. "Shut up, you don't know what you're talking about!"

"Mr. Harper!" Mrs. Rachel screeched, jumping back as Joey accidentally upset the table. "That's enough! Out of my class, now!"

In a huff, Joey left the classroom to stand out in the hallway. Gar got up to help Mrs. Rachel get the table back up. Once that was done, Mrs. Rachel told Gar to sit back down and she swept out of the room to talk to Joey.

"What was that all about?" asked Cole, or Colin, as his twin peered over his shoulder.

"Heck if I know," Gar replied, shrugging, and letting his head fall forward onto the table with a thud. Still, he couldn't help but wonder what was wrong with Joey.

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Dick was nervous. They had a test in Home Ec. The students were supposed to bake cookies or something like that, he really wasn't sure. But if it involved Dick and a gas oven, he was sure things would not end well.

He was right.

So far, Dick had only had a few minor incidents. A few weeks ago he'd almost had another "Thanksgiving Incident" when he'd tried to heat up a potato wrapped in tinfoil. Luckily Dick had remembered and had rescued the potato just in time. The week prior to that he'd accidentally set Heather Brown's apron on fire, but how he'd managed that he would never know. Heather had been nice enough about it—she'd hit him over the head with her spatula, true, but she'd been laughing when she did it. There were other small incidents and explosions Dick had caused as well, but nothing too major. Still, it was a wonder Mrs. Cook was letting him near an oven at all.

About halfway through the class, Dick was scowling heavily at the recipe book on the table in front of him. He was in a bad enough mood—all the good aprons had been taken and Dick had gotten stuck with one with a floral print. The other three or four boys were sniggering behind their hands at him, but they didn't tease him beyond that. No one teased him or any of his friends after Dick had put Bradley in his place. Joey still got shoved into a locker from time to time, but he never saw the culprit. If he did, he wasn't telling.

Dick was very carefully warming up the gas oven when the door to the Home Ec. room opened. Dick's natural curiosity forced him to look—the Art teacher had just walked in with Joey. He was looking extremely angry, his face as red as his hair, and the teacher had a pronounced frown on her face as she spoke quietly with Mrs. Cook. Dick pretended to be looking at his book, and he strained his ears to listen.

"Yes, Emma, of course I'll hold him for the period… goodness, no reason to trouble the principal now, what with the leak—"

Mrs. Rachel quickly shushed her and glanced around, but Dick was the only student who had heard.

"I've got to go, Carlene," said Mrs. Rachel with a guarded look at Dick. "My class will go berserk if I leave them for too long. Just put Mr. Harper here in the back and leave him alone; he needs to cool down." Joey's scowl deepened. Mrs. Rachel left the classroom and Joey was shooed to the back, near Dick. Heather Brown watched him go by with interest.

"Hey, Joey," Dick said with a grin. Joey didn't respond, and instead grabbed a chair and plunked down in it, glaring furiously at the wall. "What's going on?"

Dick had never seen Joey so angry. In fact, he didn't know Joey _did_ angry; normally he was so peppy and cheerful that it was hard to imagine he felt anything negative at all. The redhead before Dick now was a very different Joey. Dick pulled uncomfortably at his collar, partly out of nerves at dealing with a severely ticked off Joey, partly because the room had gotten very warm in the past few moments. He supposed this was due to the fact that everyone was baking.

"Rachel sent me out of the class," Joey muttered. His face suddenly contorted in fury. "I blew up on her."

"What?" Dick turned away from the oven for just a second. "Why did you blow up—?"

This, it turned out, was a very bad choice of words. Dick never got to finish his sentence because suddenly the gas oven behind him exploded.

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Ten minutes later found the Home Ec. room a disaster area. Every teacher on the hall had rushed down with fire extinguishers and finally put out the flames. No one had been seriously hurt; the least fortunate had gotten a bruise or two at the most. The room itself hadn't fared so well. The entire wall was gone, and little metal bits of the oven were strewn about the floor along with the rest of the rubble. Students crowded at the doors of their classrooms to look at the wreckage.

The Home Ec. students stood in a confused huddle, loudly demanding to know what the heck had happened. Only two were absent from the group, and they were sitting against the wall.

Dick was covered from head to toe in black soot as a result from the smoke, so that his bright blue eyes were just about the only discernable features of his face. They were round and shocked, and his mouth was hanging wide open, unable to comprehend the fact that he'd just blown up the Home Ec. room. The blast had ruffled his hair even more than he had taken to arranging it, making it look more windswept than normal. He was uttering incomprehensible phrases that made no sense when you strung them together.

"But… I only looked—only turned for a second… then the oven, the oven—it… it _exploded _and—and…" He shook his head, his eyes still wide open.

"Yeah, that was cool, wasn't it?" Joey beamed from beneath the layer of soot that obscured his freckles. The explosion had vastly improved his mood. "I wonder what caused it? Let's do it again!"

"But the wall was _gone…_" Dick stuttered. Joey wasn't able to get a full sentence out of him in this state of shock, so he just chattered on happily, fully aware that Dick wasn't listening: "Hey Dick, nice apron!"

A few minutes later, Mrs. Cook came stomping up to him. She looked absolutely livid.

"You," she said, pointing at Dick. "Front office. Now. I'm going to get you out of my class if it kills me. Move it!" Dick, unable to think of anything else to do, got up numbly and began the walk up to the office.

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Logan was bored out of his mind. He'd been sitting up at the front office for at least an hour, and he still hadn't been admitted to see the principal. Aside from the explosion about ten minutes ago, nothing interesting had happened except that various school officials kept running in and out of the office, looking distressed.

Hearing footsteps in the hallway, Logan turned lazily to look. Dick staggered into view, covered in soot and looking dazed.

"Hey," said Logan nonchalantly as Dick plopped down beside him.

"Hey yourself," Dick returned, grinning sheepishly.

"I'm almost afraid to ask, but what happened to you?" Logan studied his friend thoughtfully—the boy looked as though he'd just crawled up a chimney, and he smelled like smoke. Dick went scarlet. He opened his mouth to say something, shut it, and tried again. Logan, who'd heard about Dick's abysmal cooking abilities, put two and two together.

"You blew up the Home Ec. room, didn't you?" he asked, grinning.

"It was an accident, I swear!" Dick cried despairingly. Logan dissolved into a fit of hysterical laughter.

_"You blew up the Home Ec. room! _That's _awesome!"_ he practically crowed. Dick sank lower in his seat, his face and ears a bright red even beneath the soot. The debris on the back of his shirt left a streak on the bench.

"What did you do to get sent up here, Logan?" he asked after his friend stopped laughing, hoping to change the subject. Logan shrugged carelessly but looked around with caution before going on. "My powers are on the fritz right now," he muttered in a low voice. "It happens every now and then; Gadget says it'll stop after a while. Says it has something to do with puberty."

"More than I wanted to know, but okay, keep going."

"Well, I was in Biology when my hand went intangible and I dropped one of the beakers I was holding. Spilt chemicals all over the floor."

"And they sent you to the office for that?" Dick asked incredulously.

"Yeah, considering it's the—oh, I'd say about the tenth or eleventh one this year."

"Going for a record, are you?" Dick asked with a smirk. Logan grinned and punched him playfully in the shoulder. Or, he tried to—Logan's fist suddenly went intangible and passed right through, giving both boys the sensation of plunging into a bucket of ice.

"Sorry!" said Logan quickly, yanking his fist back. He flexed it for a moment and it went solid again. "That's what I'm talking about. It just happens."

"That's okay. It's like being around Raven when she's in a bad mood; light bulbs start blowing up and stuff."

"Sort of." Logan let out an exasperated sigh. "Good grief, I wish the principal would hurry up already—I'd rather be sitting in class than out here with nothing to do."

"I'd just as soon stay as far away from the Home Ec. room as I can," said Dick, looking genuinely frightened at the prospect of being in the same hallway as Mrs. Cook. "What are they doing in there, anyway?"

"I don't know. I keep hearing something about an information leak."

"I heard about that too. Any idea what it means?" Logan shook his head.

"Not really." He grinned slyly. "But I know how we can find out."

Logan got up off the bench and walked over to the door of the office. Crouching to the floor, he cocked his head, indicating for Dick to come over.

As soon as Dick and Logan were on the same level, Logan put a hand on Dick's shoulder. "It's about to get a little cold."

"What are we going to do?"

"I'm going to make us intangible so we can look in on what's going on."

"No offense," said Dick skeptically, "but I'm not so sure that's a good idea. Won't someone notice if we just suddenly phase through the wall?"

"Well, duh." Logan rolled his eyes. "I'm going to make us invisible too."

"Will it work—I mean…"

"What, our clothes?" Dick's ears turned red. "As long as they're in direct contact with our bodies, I should be able to make our clothes invisible. Our shoes might stay visible, but the rest of us won't be. Ready?" Dick nodded. Logan concentrated, and suddenly things went oddly cold as they both became intangible. Logan grinned, and stuck his head through the wall.

Dick stared. Logan pulled his head back out. "Are you coming or not?" Dick shook off his amazement and stuck his head through too.

It was a very curious sensation, to have his head on one side of a wall with the rest of his body on the other. Dick glanced to the side at Logan, but he wasn't there. Logan had turned them invisible. Sudden loud shouting startled Dick from his thoughts.

"CAN'T TRACE IT?!?!" someone bellowed. Dick's ears pricked up—the voice sounded familiar, but he couldn't tell who it was. A plant was blocking his view of the desk. "What do you mean, you can't trace it?"

"Exactly what I said!" snapped another voice, equally ill tempered. "Whoever it was that hacked into the files did a thorough job—I can't tell who it was that did it. The only reason I noticed was that the database showed the files had been opened sometime late last night." There was an exasperated sigh and a creaking sound, as though someone was leaning resignedly back in their chair.

"What were the hackers after?" the first person asked finally. The voice was female, and Dick assumed that this was the principal judging by her authoritive tone.

"I'm not sure," replied the second person, a man. "As far as we can tell, the hacker was after the students' health records. Allergies, blood types, birth certificates…"

Dick looked skeptically over at Logan, forgetting for a moment that they were invisible.

"And there's no tracing it?" the first asked.

"No. We've tried at least a dozen times."

"Try again," the principal snapped. "Try until you've found out who has done this. We cannot have this sort of thing happening. The safety of the students—"

"Enough," Logan whispered, his voice strained. "Come back through, I can't hold us any longer…"

Reluctantly, anxious to hear more, Dick pulled his head back through the wall. Logan became visible again and sat back on his heels on the floor, looking exhausted. Warmth rushed back to Dick's limbs as he solidified.

"Sorry," Logan wheezed. "I was getting tired, and I didn't want my powers to give out and accidentally get us splinched."

_"Splinched?" _Dick asked. "You took that straight out of Harry Potter."

"Yes, and for a right good reason. If one half of your body is on one side of the wall, and the other half is on the other side, and you become solid again, the pressure of whatever you've passed through splits you clean in half."

Dick winced. "Great. That's just great."

"You're telling me," Logan grimaced. He jerked his head toward the office. "What do you think that was all about? The leak and everything."

"I'm not sure," Dick replied, his eyebrows knitting together. "Why would someone bother going through the student health records?"

"Search me. Unless…" Logan looked thoughtful for a moment. "Nah, never mind. It's stupid."

"What is it?"

Logan never got to answer. The door to the office opened, revealing a tall, thin, balding man with glasses perched upon his thin nose and a frown firmly in place. Completely aware that they had just been caught eavesdropping and unable to think of anything else to do, both boys flashed him angelic "We didn't do it" grins. He didn't buy it.

"Excuse me, Angelina," he said, his eyes narrowing at the two boys on the floor. "But I believe you have visitors."

"What? Who is it, Crawley?"

The principal appeared from behind him. She was a rather small woman, wearing a jacket and matching skirt in a businesslike manner. Her iron-gray hair was twisted up into a neat little bun on the top of her head. On the whole, she had a rather unremarkable appearance, which was why Logan gave Dick a very funny look when the boy gasped and stuttered out, "M-M-Mrs. Gardner!"

"Oh, hello, Mr. Grayson," the woman replied with a taut smile. "And Mr. Marshall too, what a surprise. Did you break another beaker?"

"Yes, ma'am," Logan answered. Mrs. Gardner frowned and turned to Dick.

"I already know why you're here, Mr. Grayson, Mrs. Cook e-mailed me not ten minutes ago. How on earth did you manage to blow up the Home Ec. room?"

"I—er… don't know," he confessed, turning red again. Looking up, he could have sworn he saw a small, fleeting smile on her face before she turned stern again.

"I suppose I ought to give you detention, but giving the circumstances I'll be willing to let this slide," she said. Mr. Crawley looked at her as though she'd lost her mind.

"Ma'am, if I may say—"

"That will be all, Crawley," Mrs. Gardner snapped. "Wait for me in the staff lounge, I will be there shortly." Crawley gave Dick and Logan a nasty look before shuffling off down the hall. "Now, as for you two, I'm going to assume that you heard what was going on in my room?"

"Well…"

"A bit…" The boys got to their feet and stood straight, preparing themselves for a scolding.

"I want you to think nothing of it. It is a domestic problem that will be taken care of shortly. I daresay you two have enough on your plates, what with all your schoolwork and—extracurricular activities…" She looked pointedly at Dick when she said this, although Dick had the sneaking impression that she knew Logan's secret too somehow. "Now, off with the both of you, I have some business to attend to." She made a move to go past them, but Dick, thinking quickly, said, "Ma'am? I was wondering—I think Mrs. Cook wanted to get me a different elective so I—"

"I've already seen to that. Mrs. Coggins has already transferred you into Drama for that period. I hope you can use your knack for making things explode to construct some decent stage props." She paused, looking at them both. "Mr. Marshall, do me a favor. If Mr. Abbott asks, tell him I shouted at you for twenty minutes and gave you a detention. He'll pitch a royal fit if he doesn't think I've punished you somehow."

"Will do, ma'am," said Logan with a grin.

"Good boy. Now, off to class with you!" She turned and strode down the hall, leaving the boys to stand alone.

"What's up with you?" Logan asked finally, seeing Dick's face still slightly stunned. Dick gave his head a small shake.

_"She's_ the one we told you about, the one that came and told us we had to go to school!" he said, amazed. "I didn't know she was a principal!"

"Stranger things have happened," Logan shrugged. "Trust me, I'm one of them."

"And now I'm out of Cook's class! _Yes!"_ Dick punched the air triumphantly.

"Aren't Raven and Ashley in Drama?" Logan asked.

"Oh yeah, I forgot about that. Well, the more the merrier." Dick suddenly froze and did a double take, looking out the window he had just passed. "Hang on a sec… did you just see something?"

Logan joined him at the window. "No, why…. _Holy crap!"_

Dick's eyes had not lied to him. Lumbering outside, near the blasted wall of the Home Ec. room, was a great, blob-like, many-eyed _thing_, easily ten or twelve feet tall. Logan's mouth dropped open as far as his jaw would allow in a silent scream of horror. His face went from white to green in seconds, and he looked like he was about to be sick.

"That's—that's…" He opened and closed his mouth a few times, completely unable to find words to describe the abomination outside.

"Plasmus," said Dick grimly. "What the heck is he doing _here?"_

"He's going inside!" Logan squeaked in an uncharacteristically high voice. "Holy crap, holy crap, _he's going inside!"_

"Logan, calm down!" Dick grabbed his friend's shoulder and gave it a rough shake. "It's okay. He doesn't know we're here; we have surprise on our side. We have to rally the Titans and get into our uniforms before he does too much damage. Okay?" Logan made a sound like a beached goldfish, swallowed, and nodded. Dick pulled his communicator out of his pocket and pressed the panic button. Within minutes, he knew, the Titans would meet outside their lockers for their assignments. Logan pressed a button on his watch to alert Ashley.

Already, people had seen Plasmus and were panicking. The whole Home Ec. class bolted out of the hallway, screaming in terror.

"This would be a whole lot easier if we were invisible," Dick suggested with a sideways look at Logan. The other boy nodded and grabbed Dick's shoulder.

The frantic teenagers in the crowd were too terrified to notice that they were jostled roughly by some unseen force, and no one saw that two pairs of sneakers were making their way to the freshman hallway.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

"What's going on?" Vic asked the minute Dick and Logan popped back into view at their lockers. "And what happened to you, Dick? You look like you fell into a fireplace."

Dick waved his hand impatiently. "Never mind that, we've got bigger problems right now. You'll never guess who just showed up in the electives hallway."

"Plasmus," Logan put in immediately. While Ashley looked bewildered, the other four merely looked astonished.

_"What?"_ asked Gar in a horrified voice. "How'd he get into the school?"

"Well, um… he came in through a hole in the wall—"

"You mean the crater you made in the Home Ec. room?"

"That was _you?"_ asked Victor, looking delighted. "Boo-yah! Raven, you owe me twenty bucks."

"Can we get back to the subject?" Dick snapped. "Get your uniforms, quick—he's already working his way down the electives hall; my Home Ec. classmates were in hysterics."

Without waiting for further instructions, the Titans, Phantom and Livewire seized their costumes from their lockers and tore into the nearest bathroom, which, thankfully and like the hallway, was empty.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Moments later, the hallway was packed with hectic students, all screaming and fighting tooth and nail to get to the exits. Teachers raced through the din, trying to restore calm, but were having no luck.

A great cheer went up when the Titans flew overhead, the land-bound boys carried by the girls.

"Look, the Teen Titans!"

"Phantom and Livewire!"

"They'll save us!"

The school was in absolute chaos. The frenzied teenagers were in a state of panic. Students were tripping over themselves and disappearing under their classmates. Small students like Joey would be crushed.

"We have to get the other kids out of here before someone gets killed!" Robin shouted over the noise.

"Do you have any suggestions?" Livewire yelled back.

"No! We'll have to wing it!"

The Titans split up, trying to shepherd students out of the exits. Livewire was flying overhead, pushing kids if necessary; Beastboy had turned into a T-rex and students were tripping over themselves just to get away from him; Raven surrounded large groups of students with her aura and teleported them out of the school; Phantom and Robin were on the ground, trying to direct traffic without getting crushed; Starfire and Cyborg were taking a more direct approach by picking up students and throwing them bodily out the exits and to safety.

"That's most of them!" Livewire gasped, holding a stitch in her side and panting. It was a bit of an overstatement—they had succeeded in emptying the school of half of its students; the rest were running around the hallways like chickens with their heads cut off.

"Where is Plasmus?" asked Starfire, her green starbolts shimmering at her fists.

Before anyone could answer, Plasmus himself burst through the wall, uttering horrible screeches through what one could only assume was his mouth. Everyone who had been remotely near that particular wall bolted away screaming, but not before Plasmus had taken a swipe into the crowd with his blob-like arms. He withdrew a student and shoved her under one arm, where he already held the screaming twins Cole and Colin, and a mop of flaming red hair that could only be Joey.

"He's abducting students!" Cyborg shouted unnecessarily.

"Titans, go!" Robin bellowed. "But be careful, we don't want to hurt anybody!"

Plasmus let loose another one of those terrible screeching screams and charged bodily into another crowd of students just as the Titans charged at him.

Raven managed to put up a magic barrier around the students so that Plasmus couldn't get at them. "Run!" she bellowed, and she looked so dangerous with black magic crackling in lightning bolts that she was instantly obeyed. Plasmus slashed out at Raven's shield and knocked her against the wall.

"Over here, you Play-Doh monster!" shouted Phantom from somewhere in the hall, invisible. Plasmus swung his head around just in time for a well-aimed piece of brick to find its mark. The bit of rubble sank far into the pulpy mess covering his body. From up in the air, Livewire made an absolutely revolted noise. Plasmus heard her and slung one of his massive arms. Livewire hit the ceiling with a wet _slap!_

"Oh, GROSS!" she shouted, trying to fly free, but she was stuck tight. Starfire saw and flew up to help. She and Cyborg could do very little besides throw things at Plasmus, because misaimed starbolts and plasma cannons could potentially kill the hostages. Cyborg was on the ground with Beastboy, hurling very large things more to distract Plasmus than anything else. Phantom was running around, invisible, shouting and throwing things and generally driving Plasmus insane. Raven was still trying to keep him from grabbing students, while Robin was hurling every freezer disk in his utility belt as Plasmus's feet, trying to freeze him to the ground. It wasn't working.

Plasmus swung his huge head around, not overly concerned with the Titan's efforts but very annoyed at an invisible someone throwing things at him. The disembodied voice came from the direction of a moving shadow, but it moved too fast to pinpoint it. Plasmus watched it as he sent a jet of slime barreling into Cyborg. Robin saw the comprehension dawning on his face.

"Phantom, quit talking to him!" he shouted. It was an unnecessary warning: Plasmus decided he didn't want to bother locating the source and compensated. With a huge grunt, Plasmus released an explosion of… _whatever _it was he was made up of, knocking every young hero against the wall.

Robin frantically wiped the goop off his mask and looked around. Plasmus was roaring furiously and flinging rubble aside as though he were looking for something. A few feet away, a frightened girl peeked over a fallen ceiling tile. Robin recognized her easily as the girl Plasmus had picked up—she was covered from the neck down in sludge. Joey had already disappeared, and the twins were nowhere in sight.

"Run!" Robin told her. Not waiting for another word, the girl bolted for the nearest exit. "Titans! He's lost the hostages! Get him!"

Now the real fight began. Livewire and Starfire teamed up in a double attack, releasing a volley of starbolts and balls of lightning on Plasmus's head. They were accompanied by a tremendous blast from Cyborg's plasma cannon.

"HAH!" Cyborg yelled triumphantly. "Gotcha, booger-man!" Plasmus responded with a torrent of acid spewing from his mouth.

"Dude, he spits _acid?"_ Livewire shrieked incredulously. _"That _would have been nice to know!"

"Well, now you do!" Robin shouted back, running as fast as he could away from the acidic vomit Plasmus was throwing at him. Beastboy helped out by transforming into a brontosaurus and whacking Plasmus with his huge tail. This made the blob-like monster turn the poisonous green torrent on the changeling, who morphed into a bird and flapped frantically away. Raven glided to the center of the hall and raised her hands.

"Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos!" she shouted, her eyes glowing, and a Coke machine farther down the hall detached itself from the wall and began firing out sodas like a machine gun at Plasmus's unprotected, protuberant green eyes. The monster screamed and shielded them with his huge, dripping arms.

Someone was screaming loudly. Robin looked around; one of the twins was standing in the middle of the hall, his mouth open in horror, all the color drained from his face, staring straight at Plasmus.

"Come on, move it!" Robin snarled, grabbing the twin by the collar and attempting to drag him away. Whichever twin it was screamed even louder and struggled, yelling, _"Cole's still in there!"_

"What?" Robin asked, freezing. "In _where?"_ Colin pointed with a shaking finger at Plasmus.

"He's still in the slime?" Robin bellowed incredulously. Colin nodded, his eyes still wide with panic. Robin leapt away, shouting, "Stop, STOP! Someone's still in there! THERE'S SOMEONE STUCK IN THE SLIME!"

"Oh, come ON!" Phantom shouted angrily, his voice coming from a mound of sludge that had plastered itself around a chunk of seemingly empty air in a roughly humanoid shape. "He's a blob of putty, he shouldn't be this hard to beat!"

"Where's Cole stuck?" Livewire asked, looking at Colin. The twin turned his terrified eyes to her and didn't reply, but after Cyborg once again blasted Plasmus in the head with his sonic cannon he screamed, "The stomach, he's stuck around the stomach!"

"You'd better be right!" Livewire snapped, bracing herself against the wall. Before any of the others could figure out what was going on, she rocketed off the wall and, flying straight as an arrow, into Plasmus's abdomen. Plasmus screeched and convulsed in agony, and seconds later Livewire burst through the sludge straight through his back, her arms wrapped around the struggling form of Cole Greenwich. As soon as they were out of harm's way, Raven, Cyborg, Starfire, and Robin hit Plasmus with a combined attack of magic, plasma, starbolts, and electric disks.

With a terrible scream, Plasmus exploded, showering the young heroes with yet another layer of purplish slime. In the middle of the wreckage lay a small, skinny man in nothing but his boxers, sleeping like a baby.

"Livewire, you _idiot!"_ Robin yelled at her as she touched ground, still holding a thoroughly shocked Cole. Finding solid ground so close, Cole squirmed free and ran toward his twin. Horrified though he was at the fact that his cousin had just flown through a monster, Robin was relieved to see her unharmed. Livewire pulled a face that was hardly distinguishable underneath the sludge.

"Oh, shut up," she snapped. "I'm the one who should be complaining over here; _look_ at me! I look like I fell into a vat of purple Jell-O! What on earth am I going to tell my mother?"

"Let's stick with the Jell-O excuse and see how far we get," said Phantom, reappearing and trying to comb Plasmus goop out of his curly hair with his fingers. "God, my mom is going to kill me…"

"I feel for you, my friend," Beastboy grinned, clapping a hand on Phantom's shoulder. It was hard to tell which one of them got splattered with more slime at this exchange. "Ah, the perks of living in a giant T with no grown-ups…"

"I believe I feel the need to 'call the shower,' as you would say it," said Starfire, flying back down to their level and attempting to wipe slime off her arm. It made very little improvement.

"Hang on a sec…" Robin was doing something with his communicator. "Okay, got it." He flipped it shut and returned it to his pocket. "I just called the police; they should be here in a few minutes."

"What do we need the police for?" asked Livewire. "We already beat the bad guy…"

"Yeah, but someone has to take him to jail."

"What are they going to do, scrape him off the walls and carry him in a bucket?" she snorted. The Titans led her over to where the unconscious man was snoring away. Her mouth popped open. "You mean, this little guy—_this… little… guy_—did _this?"_ She gestured to the demolished hallway and to the slime that covered it. "But… he—" Unable to finish her sentence, Livewire fixed a pout on her face and folded her arms, saying, "Dude, I hate your villains."

A noise from behind them made the Titans turn around. Mrs. Gardner was walking towards them, followed closely by Mr. Crawley, picking their way carefully over the rubble and puddles of slime.

"Well done, Titans," said Mrs. Gardner, ignoring the stupefied expressions on the faces of Cyborg, Starfire, Raven and Beastboy. "You managed to keep a dangerous criminal from abducting any of our students."

"Not to mention destroy two hallways in the process," Crawley interjected dryly.

"Yeah, um… Sorry about that," said Robin sheepishly. "It couldn't really be helped."

A large chunk of ceiling fell between them from when Beastboy had morphed into a dinosaur and grown too big for the building to hold. Crawley gave a derisive snort.

"That's enough, Crawley," Mrs. Gardner snapped. Looking astonished at the fact that he had once again been dismissed on the account of teenagers, Crawley turned and began to retreat out of the hall, slipping in a rather undignified way in a puddle of slime.

"Mrs. Gardner," Robin said as soon as Crawley was out of earshot. "Could we be excused from school for the rest of the day? I think we've earned it." He glanced behind him—Beastboy and Raven were covered in slime from head to foot, and Cyborg's joints were getting clogged from the sludge. Logan's hair was plastered to his forehead in a purple mess, and Starfire was wringing the goop out of hers. Ashley looked as though someone had dumped her into a can of lumpy purple paint. It was a rather comical sight, and Robin could only imagine how he himself must look.

"Yes, of course. You are all excused, including you two… Mr. Marshall and Miss Thompson, if I am not mistaken?" Phantom didn't seem particularly surprised, but Livewire looked horrified. "Oh, don't look so panicked, Ashley, I figured this out when you seven began hanging around each other all the time and the Titans picked up two new members." Livewire tried to regain her composure and scowled.

"You might, however, want to come with an excuse to tell your parents. Many will be coming to pick up their children because of the attack, and what with the attempted kidnapping, your mothers and fathers might get worried."

"We'll call them and tell them we went home with Dick," said Phantom. "Thanks, Mrs. Gardner."

"Don't mention it," she replied with a stony smile. "Oh, and there will be no school for the remainder of the week, so feel free to sleep in tomorrow. We have to find someone to fix these walls before classes can resume."

"That's too bad," said Robin, attempting to sound sincere while Beastboy punched the air and silently mouthed the word _Yes!_

"Excuse us." Everyone jumped and looked toward the hole in the wall left by Plasmus. A police officer with curly brown hair flashed his badge and took a step into what was left of the hall. "My squad is outside—we're here to pick up the criminal."

"Oh, crap…" said Phantom quietly. In the midst of all the action, Phantom and Livewire had forgotten to flee before the police showed up. The officer heard him and frowned.

"Yes, Phantom and Livewire…" he said. A news crew and other police officers poked their heads curiously through the wall. He cleared his throat and turned to face the Titans. "I'm afraid, now that we've got them, we're going to have to take in these two. Unsponsered young superheroes must be put under the protection of the government according to—"

"Wait, hang on!" Robin cut in, alarmed. Phantom and Livewire had moved automatically toward each other, their faces white beneath the muck. They and the Titans knew very well what "under the protection of the government" meant for metahumans, and it wasn't a reassuring statement. Ashley stood on her toes for a moment, ready to fly the second anyone made a move toward her or Logan.

"Unsponsered young superheroes?" Robin repeated. "What about us?" He already knew the answer, but an idea had suddenly sparked in his brain. It was so simple he could have kicked himself for not thinking of it before.

"Justice League protection," the officer said simply. "Now, if you two will—"

"No, wait!" Robin interrupted impatiently. "The Justice League has put the Teen Titans under their protection, right?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Well, as the leader of the Teen Titans, I am now putting Phantom, Livewire, and _all _of the Super Six under _our _protection. And if you have a problem with that—" he continued, ignoring the fact that the policeman had just opened his mouth to object, "—you can pick it up with Batman."

The police officer shut his mouth, his mustache bristling. For a moment he looked like he actually _would_ take it up with Batman. Then, with a scowl, he shrugged and said, "Fine. The Super Six are under Titan protection. Government officials will not touch them here or in Rachel."

If Phantom and Livewire's grins of relief had gotten any wider, they would have fallen off their faces. They all watched as the officer radioed in and relayed the message to his superiors, and then took his squad and put Plasmus, once again, in his isolated chamber specially designed to keep him asleep and human.

"Well, I suppose that solves quite a bit of inconvenience," said Mrs. Gardner simply. "I'll be off, then, I have quite a bit of work to do myself. Titans." She nodded cordially, then began picking her way back through the hall.

As soon as the police officers were gone and the news crews were preoccupied with filming the damage from the fight, Livewire tackled Robin from behind and pulled him into a hug.

"Ow—_jeez_, Livewire! Let go, I can't breathe, you've got me around the neck!"

"You _did _it!" she crowed, laughing. "You did it, we don't have to run away anymore, we can be normal superheroes!"

"If there was ever an oxymoron, I think 'normal superheroes' would have to be it," said Raven with a slight smile. Phantom laughed.

"Way to go, Rob," he said, clapping him on the shoulder. "What can we do to pay you back?"

"Stop Livewire from strangling me, for starters," Robin gasped. Logan obliged and pulled Ashley off of him.

"I'm going to call Hotshot and tell him as soon as I get home," Phantom beamed. Then the glee on his face evaporated. "Aw, crud, I can't go home like this! What'll I tell my mom?"

"You know," said Beastboy with a toothy smile. "I think we might be able to help with that."

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

The Titans got immense satisfaction from Logan and Ashley's awestruck expressions when they stepped into Titan's Tower for the first time.

"You _live _here? _All_ the time?" asked Ashley in amazement, looking around at the vast entrance hall.

"Yeah. It's not much, but hey, it's home," said Cyborg with a grin—he'd helped design and build the Tower with Jump City architects and his father.

"It's incredible!" said Logan, checking out the living room with the long sofa and huge windows. "Where's the TV?"

"Press that switch over there," Robin explained. Logan pressed it and instantly the window flickered and began showing a football game.

_"Whoa!"_ exclaimed Logan appreciatively. "This kicks the crap out of our headquarters; we had to set up in an abandoned warehouse."

"We've got a Gamestation, too, that you can play on that big screen, and a computer console for each of us. The stereo is over there." Beastboy was busy showing Ashley their entertainment system.

"Starfire's already called the first shower, but there's another shower up on the roof near the pool," said Robin.

"You guys have a _pool?"_ asked Logan.

"Yeah. Towels are in the hall closet—it's the fifth door on the right. Make yourself at home."

"I can't get a bath yet—Raven and Starfire have beaten me to it." Logan grinned. "How about showing me this Gamestation I keep hearing about?"

Ten minutes later, Logan and Cyborg were locked in a fierce battle, fingers flying over the controllers and giving each other dirty glares. Robin and Beastboy had already been soundly defeated (Robin by Logan, Beastboy by Cyborg). Beastboy was now watching with interest, Ashley sitting closely beside him. Robin was nowhere to be seen. A few minutes later, he reentered the room, carrying something behind his back and smiling in a rather nasty way. Coming up behind his cousin, he brought a large, pale white, maggot-like creature from behind his back and dumped it unceremoniously into Ashley's lap.

It had been quite a hassle trying to find Silkie and then coaxing him out from under Starfire's bed, but hearing Ashley scream was worth it. Robin and Beastboy both roared with laughter as Ashley shot off the couch in terror, sending Silkie reeling into Logan. Logan let out a startled yelp and jumped to his feet. The momentary respite allowed Cyborg to blaze past Logan's ship on the screen.

"What _is_ that… that thing?" Ashley screeched, flattening herself into a corner on the ceiling.

"What's wrong, Ash? Don't you like Silkie?" Robin picked the mutated moth larvae up and rubbed its head.

"NO!" Ashley snapped, now looking murderous. "What are you playing at, dropping that thing on me?"

"Well, I just thought that since you introduced me to _your _pets, I would show you ours." Robin held Silkie out at arm's length after Starfire's pet tried to lick him in the face. He didn't care what Beastboy said; being licked by a mutated moth was _not_ the same as being licked by a dog. Robin grinned up at his cousin. "I told you I would get you back for setting your dogs on me!"

"You're really rotten, do you know that?"

"So are you. Oh, look, now you've got Plasmus goop on our ceiling." Beastboy lost it right there—he laughed so hard he fell off the sofa and lay on the floor, clutching his ribs.

"You're both dead," Ashley snarled.

"What are you going to do?" asked Beastboy, propping himself up on one elbow with an impish grin. "You're too scared of big bad Silkie to come down!"

"I don't have to come down!" With a flick of her fingers, Ashley hit them both with small lightning bolts, making their hair stand on end.

Raven walked into the room with a towel draped over her neck, her hair still slightly wet from her shower.

"I'm done," she announced. "Who's up?"

Ashley flew wordlessly from her corner and disappeared through the automatic door before it had fully closed.

"Guess she is," said Raven with a shrug.

With a prodigious, computer-animated explosion, Logan's ship blew apart into a thousand tiny fragments. Cyborg let out a loud "BOO-YAH!"

"Ah, he got me," said Logan in a defeated tone. "Here, Gar, you can play, I have to call my mom to let her know where I am… at Dick's house." He winked and strode off toward the kitchen.

Logan didn't return until both Starfire and Ashley had returned from their showers, and Robin and Beastboy had been able to wash the sludge off of themselves as well. Now Cyborg was in the shower. Logan sat down in Cy's place when he returned.

"Get in touch with your mom?" asked Ashley.

"Nah," Logan shook his head. "I forgot; it's my grandmother's birthday, so she's probably on the phone with her. Took me ten minutes to get hold of Dad, he was still trying to get Plasmus to the prison—"

"What?" asked Robin.

"Oh, yeah, my dad's a police officer. I can't believe I haven't mentioned that already. You know that man we talked to at the school, who wanted to take me and Livewire in?"

"That's your _dad?"_ asked Beastboy, dumbfounded. Logan grinned and nodded.

"I do not understand—why would your father wish to take you and Ashley to a government containment facility?" asked Starfire, her eyebrows knit together.

"He didn't know it was me, or else he wouldn't have," Logan assured her. "It's really funny, actually; we've had so many close calls with the police, it's a wonder he hasn't figured out it's me yet."

"That explains how you two kept getting the same alarms we were," said Robin thoughtfully. "You wired your watches to pick up the transmissions from your dad's patrol car."

"Yep," Logan nodded. "Gadget did it for us, right before we left, so we wouldn't still be picking up transmissions from Rachel. He did it for the others, too, so they wouldn't be getting alerts from Jump City."

"Clever," said Robin. "We've got one free shower, just so you know."

Logan and Cyborg finished at about the same time; Cyborg had to take some extra time out to scrape his joints free of the hardened slime.

"Alright, who's my next victim?" he asked with a wide grin, watching Gar and Dick fighting it out on the Gamestation.

Robin paused the game. "Are you up for a little detective work?" he asked, turning around.

"That depends. What kind of work are we talking about?" The boys quit their game and stood up.

"The kind you're really, really good at. Something to do with computers."

Robin and Logan filled the others in about all they had heard in Mrs. Gardner's office. By the time they were done, Cyborg had already accessed the school's private files and was hacking his way into the health records on one of the Titan's computer consoles.

"Won't the school be able to trace _this_ hacking back to us?" asked Raven. Cyborg grinned and patted the side of the console almost lovingly.

"Not this baby," he said. "The Titan's computer can hack into any database short of the CIA, and won't be picked up."

"Are you in yet?" asked Robin, leaning over Cyborg's shoulder.

"Give me a second. They've upped security lately…" There was a slight _ping_ from the computer. "Got it!"

"So what are you looking for?" asked Ashley, tilting her head to one side.

"Something that shouldn't be here. When a computer file gets hacked into, the hacker leaves small, almost undetectable… holes, I guess you could call them, where they got in. Those holes can be traced right back to them. It's kind of like a fingerprinting system for computers." Ashley nodded, although it couldn't be clearer that she, like many of the others, had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. "Here we go…" Cyborg's cybernetic fingers practically flew over the keyboard as he gave the computer instructions. "Let's see what we've got here."

The others waited quietly as Cyborg worked on tracing the link. After several minutes of frustrating silence, Logan began humming the Jeopardy theme song. Robin finally spoke up.

"Well?"

"It won't let me through!" Cyborg sounded shocked that someone else had outsmarted his computer system. "Something keeps interfering—every time I get close, the link terminates and sends me right back to the school files. It's like a loop or something—this is _way _advanced, if I can't get through it…"

"More advanced than the CIA?" asked Beastboy incredulously.

"That or really really close to it," Cyborg replied.

"Okay," said Robin, kneading his forehead in slight frustration. "We can't trace it. Can you tell what exactly the hacker was looking at?"

"Yeah. I'll just run a search on the hole locations…" Another window popped up on the screen. "Like you said, health records. Blood types, birth certificates, height, weight, all this stuff—wait, hang on…" Cyborg frowned. "Certain students' files have been book marked."

"Are you sure it's by the hacker?" asked Robin, leaning closer to the screen.

"Yeah, it's got the same electrostatic signature…" He scanned through the database, isolating the book marked files. "Look, here are the twins… and that girl Plasmus picked up, her name is Brianna Woodcroft… and here's Joey… and at least a dozen others… Ashley, Logan, you're on here too…"

_"What?"_ Ashley, being unable to see over Cyborg, hovered a few feet off the ground. Logan took a more direct approach and, making his upper body intangible, simply phased through Cyborg's torso to get a better look at the screen. It was very disturbing to see Logan's curly head sticking through Cyborg's chest.

"Great, now you've seen, so get out of me, please…"

"Sorry!" Logan grinned and pulled himself back out and looked over Raven's shoulder instead.

"I don't like that," said Ashley, hugging herself protectively. "I don't like that at all…"

"So we know that whoever the hacker is has an interest in students, but only specific ones… Wait." Robin frowned and touched the screen gently, still immersed in thought. "Plasmus picked up Cole and Colin, and Brianna, and Joey, too…"

"So that means—" Logan began, catching on.

"—That whoever the hacker is must have hired Plasmus to kidnap those students and bring them back to him." Robin's frown deepened. "And I think I know who it is, too."

"Robin, if you even say Slade…"

"Well, yeah!" Robin burst out angrily. "Who else do we know has a computer that we wouldn't be able to hack into? What other villain do we have that regularly employs others to do his dirty work? It's got to be Slade!"

"Maybe…" Everyone looked around at Logan, who was staring off into space thoughtfully. "But why would he want the students at all? Why would Slade want _us?"_

"That I don't know," Robin replied. "But I'm sure it's him."

"Logan," said Ashley, her voice suddenly squeaky. "You don't think that… that Professor Grimm could have anything to do with this, do you?"

Logan was still wearing that thoughtful look, still staring at the wall as though trying to memorize every square inch of it.

"I don't know, Ashley," he finally admitted. "I just don't know…"

"I really hate to interrupt while we're in the middle of something," said Beastboy tentatively, "but it doesn't look like we're going anywhere with this, so could I run a search on a student?"

"Yeah, sure, Gar. Who were you looking for?"

"Joey Harper's sister," said Gar matter-of-factly. "I don't know her name."

"I'll look." Cyborg ran a search on the last name "Harper."

"Hmmm… Well, here's Joey. And there's this kid, but he's a guy, so never mind… Oh, here, Mallory Harper. Is this her?" Cyborg pulled up a file—the profile picture showed a girl with long, dark hair, squinty gray eyes and bad acne.

"No," said Beastboy in a defeated tone. "She doesn't look anything like him, plus she's a sophomore. Joey told me his sister was about to graduate. Aren't there any more?"

"No. Harper isn't a very common last name here, I guess. Sorry, dude."

Raven was the frowner this time.

"That's weird," she said. "Why would Joey lie about having an older sister?"

"Yes," Starfire put in. "I do not see the point in telling falsehoods about older siblings. While Blackfire is a… less than desirable sister, I do not think I would say I did _not_ have her."

"Great," said Beastboy, pulling a face. "That's one more mystery to solve. I wonder what it would be like to have a normal life?"

"Dead boring," Logan grinned. "Trust me."

Robin stretched and yawned. "Good grief am I tired. I stayed up half the night working on an essay for Tatum and didn't even get to hand it in. I'm glad school's been cancelled for the week, I would have failed it for sure."

"Only because you blew it off until the last minute," scorned Raven. Robin grinned.

"Hey, a guy's got to make at least a little leisure time."

"You played Gamestation with Cyborg and Beastboy for three hours."

"… Believe it or not, that's actually pretty relaxing."

Logan took a look at his watch and swore. "It's four o'clock, I'd better get home. You ready, Ashley?"

"Yeah, I guess. See you, guys. Thanks for the showers."

"No problem. Feel free to drop by any time!" With a wave, Ashley and Logan got into the elevator and descended to the ground level. The Titans watched out the enormous window as Livewire flew into view, holding Phantom by the arms. She grinned in farewell and turned toward the city.

Beastboy bolted off the sofa and ran to one of the side windows. Flinging it open, he poked his head out and yelled "HEY!" Livewire looked around. "Don't forget to ask your folks about the Halloween Carnival!"

"We won't!" Livewire waved again, leaving Phantom to dangle perilously in the air by one arm. Grabbing hold of him again, she took off, and within a minute had turned into a speck that was soon swallowed up by the city buildings.

The Titans collapsed back onto the couch. Robin sighed and leaned back into the cushions as far as he could, his eyes closed.

"It feels really, really good to know that I don't have to wake up at six tomorrow morning."

"You've woken up at six in the morning for just about as long as I can remember," said Cyborg.

"Yeah, but somehow an alarm clock makes it a whole lot less enjoyable."

Raven was looking up with a curious expression.

"Does anybody know how we got Plasmus goop on our ceiling?" she asked. Then, "What?" after Beastboy and Robin burst into uncontrollable fits of laughter.

TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT

Professor Grimm stood in front of Slade, trembling. Slade had been in a terrible temper since the five o'clock news broadcast. Slade was playing the clip on the screen behind him now.

"You would consider us partners, wouldn't you, Grimm?" he asked delicately in his cold, oily voice. Grimm nodded, his voice stuck somewhere behind his Adam's apple. "As partners, we really ought to share any plans we come up with, don't you agree?"

Another nod. Slade rose from his chair, his voice shaking slightly with suppressed rage. "Then why, pray tell, did you employ one of _my _minions for your own purposes, instruct him to kidnap students that you hand-selected, and then have him attack Jump City High School, WITHOUT INFORMING ME?" Slade walked slowly up to Professor Grimm so that the differences in their height would be more significant. Even with his enlarged cranium, Grimm was at least a foot and a half shorter than Slade.

"I was attempting to apprehend more teenagers for my experiments," he explained feebly. "I have reason to believe that a handful of students have—have the potentiality to take to the gas positively, and I wished to—to take them into my—that is to say, our—custody so that I—I mean we—could—" He let out a literally strangled yelp; Slade had just seized him by the throat.

"I am going to say this once," he said in a low, threatening voice. "Whenever you do something, you will tell me. If you hack into another school database, you will tell me. If even the _thought_ of a plan to capture students for your experiments flits across your mind,_ you will tell me._ Have I made myself clear?"

Grimm nodded fervently; his face was turning slightly purple from his inability to breathe. Slade released him. Grimm's throat made a slight whistling sound as he inhaled, trying to re-inflate his lungs.

"As it so happens, Grimm," Slade went on, "your actions may very well have thrown us into the spotlight. Robin is not stupid, no matter how I may lead him to believe. He will trace Plasmus back to me, and will undoubtedly wonder what I want with high school students. With the combined knowledge of Phantom and Livewire, the Titans may find out that we have formed an alliance."

Slade began to work on the giant computer, leaving several minutes of uncomfortable silence for Grimm to sweat during. Finally, he spoke again.

"Thankfully, your blunder can be remedied. I have a plan that will send the Titans reeling in circles with confusion."

"Really?" Grimm inquired, thankful that Slade's fury had ebbed. "How will you do that, exactly?"

"Patience, Grimm. All in good time. Two weeks' time, in fact. Our little friends just need to redirect their focus. Things have been too quiet for my taste. We need to shake things up a little, and I know exactly where." Professor Grimm tried not to look too eager to learn Slade's plan as the other man turned to face him.

"Tell me, Grimm. Are you familiar with the annual Halloween Carnival?"


End file.
